


The Implications of Emerald and Sapphire

by FlyingPigPoet



Category: Batwoman (TV 2019), Buffy the Vampire Slayer (TV), Dollhouse, Ghostbusters (2016), Grey's Anatomy, Person of Interest (TV), Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: F/F, F/M, Good Dog Krypto the Superdog (DCU), M/M, Minor Root | Samantha Groves/Sameen Shaw
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-03
Updated: 2021-03-14
Packaged: 2021-03-14 12:22:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 12
Words: 23,488
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29171043
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FlyingPigPoet/pseuds/FlyingPigPoet
Summary: I wanted to create an S4 Fix-It Fic, but as Kaylee said in Firefly, "Sometimes a thing gets too broke to fix." So I am replacing it all instead. Knowing me, it will be long to fix what the (semi-homophobic) CW producers/writers of Supergirl broke so gradually.Here, Supergirl will be the center of her own show (gasp!). Here, her sister will be empowered to find love (with actual chemistry, gasp!). Here, people will be free to be as gay/fabulous as they need to be. And the characters who are supposed to be gay will ACTUALLY be Queer As Fuck.Since I started writing this on Feb. 19, 2020, and 100 pages later, we were in Pandemic 2020 Lockdown, the season's big bad will be Covid-19. And since I started it as if it were a regular season, I began in a mythic June (after the events in my short fic “Metropolis Pride”) and the virus cut our heroes off at the end of fall semester instead of spring. So it won't be all that accurate, but who cares? It's a SuperCorp fanfic.So put on your black tacticals, pack your sparkly pink bowties (and other bits of interest) and let us get (eventually) to the church on time for a *SuperCorp wedding*.Posting Sun/Wed.
Relationships: Alex Danvers/Agent Vasquez, Cat Grant/Lillian Luthor, J'onn J'onzz & M'gann M'orzz, James "Jimmy" Olsen & Winn Schott Jr., Jess/Winn Schott Jr., Kara Danvers/Lena Luthor, Lucy Lane/Maggie Sawyer
Comments: 67
Kudos: 29





	1. Lessons in Pride over Shame

Alex Danvers felt a little funny about the tiny bulge over her heart, pretty much invisible beneath the supersuit tactical uniform Winn Schott had built for her a while back, given that the little bulge came from a plastic rainbow ring (on a chain) that DEO Agent Susan Vasquez had given her in Metropolis at the start of June--right after Lois Lane and Clark Kent's (eventual) wedding (time travel had been involved; don't ask)--and right before most of the team attended Metropolis Pride.

There had been the parade, with Supergirl taking Superman's place flying above looking out for danger, sporting her Black/Brown Lives Matter version of the gay pride rainbow flag as a cape and representing all of her people, even though she still mostly identified as bisexual herself.

But so many of their friends and relatives identified in different ways. Her parents were straight, as were J'onn Jonzz and M'gann Morrz, Agent Riley Finn, Rose in Decontamination, Jess Huang (Lena's personal assistant) and a few others. In contrast, Agent Alex Danvers, CEO Lena Luthor, Agent Susan Vasquez, and Detective Maggie Sawyer were die-hard lesbians. 

Major Lucy Lane (and possibly her ex, Agent James Olsen), Dr. Callie Torres and Agent Winn Schott identified as bisexuals. Agent Jillian Holtzman identified as pansexual. And nobody really knew about Pam in HR, Cat Grant, or that blue alien, Brian, which was fine because that was totally their business.

And when the majority of them had attended a Drag Queen & King show where there were puppies to adopt, disco to be danced to, and fabulous exotic mixed drinks to, well, drink... it had been an interesting time.

And the fact that the (super)-out queers had taken James aside to give him the (four)-shovel talk about his potentially leading on Winn and probably breaking his heart...

Well, let's just say that Alex loved her badass friends, and also, feared them just a tiny little bit. Because James had had feelings like love for Lois Lane and then Clark Kent and then Lucy Lane and then Superman and then Kara Danvers and then Supergirl and then Lucy Lane (again) and then Winn Schott (just a little bit) and then Lena Luthor and now he was lost and adrift.

And now, as the Assistant Director, soon to be Director, of the Department of Extranormal Operations, Alex Danvers had to know the issues going on with all her agents, old and new, and somehow, deal with them.

///

Jess Huang, Lena's personal assistant at LCorp, had put up with her boss's split focus for the previous year, because she had recognized, as Lena Luthor had, that CatCo Worldwide Media, in the hands of the fascista-wanna-be CEO Morgan Edge would have been a disaster for more than just their city or their country. Lena had acquired CatCo, patriotically, as a way to protect media reliability in a world awash with propaganda and fake news.

Unfortunately, print media had been beginning to die the death ten years previously, so it took a steep discount to get people who had stopped reading print to subscribe to online papers. Lena had seen this necessity early on, right after acquiring CatCo, and had had great difficulties conveying the urgency of this shift to (then-acting-CEO) James Olsen. Lena, however, as Jess well knew, never took shit from anyone, even (and possibly especially) someone who was posturing at falling in love with her.

Jess Huang was as straight as the proverbial arrow, but that also meant that she knew men who were completely, totally straight. And that meant that she was much better than a lot of people at recognizing people who were... not.

And she looked around her, at the CatCo/LCorp/DEO mesh, and she realized that James was probably just as bi as Lucy Lane, Kara Danvers, Winn Schott, and quite likely some other of her friends.

But it would probably take a tornado, hurricane and/or great white shark to get him to explicitly admit it.

///

Kara knew that these days, game night would be... thin. Lena was working around the clock to shore up CatCo's profitability, even while she was working with Winn and her company's engineers on a number of R&D projects that were keeping her sane. Lena was at her best when doing science and engineering, just as Kara was at her best when writing, painting or saving people: so, basically, art.

And James had been pining after Lena for a while (after spending two years castigating her at every opportunity) and when Lena had explicitly turned him down, reminding him (again) that Lena was very, very gay, James had turned and noticed his best friend, Winn.

And Kara didn't know everything that had happened during the Pink K catastrophe a while back, but she guessed that it had been awkward for the two Best Bro's Forever. So yeah, the shovel talk at the Pride party had... happened. And James was being circumspect, but Kara had known him for a few years, and she knew that he was one of those people who routinely crushed on impossible people. Lena suggested that it might be because he was insecure. Kara didn't know. She just planned for him to say he was working that night, which he had, and got on with picking up pizza and potstickers to feed her guests.

Winn brought Jess, who had never joined them for game night. Alex and Vasquez both came, though they showed up separately. Kara had made sure to invite both Callie and Pam from HR, because Callie was Alex's friend, and Kara was 60/40% sure that Pam was somewhere in the LGBTQIAA etc. mix. Nobody knew. But Kara was all about inclusivity, so that.

She would have invited Holtzy, but the woman was on duty that night with Finn and James. J'onn was also busy at the DEO, arranging the handover of the Directorship to Alex. But Alex said she wouldn't miss it for the world, and Kara knew that was her way of reminding Kara that they were a team, so she blew her bangs out of her eyes and welcomed in her sister and her sister's... ex? girlfriend? assistant director?

And Winn and Jess, Callie and Pam, and Maggie and Lucy. Monopoly, she thought. When in doubt, lean on capitalism to get you through an awkward evening.

///

Lucy sat on the couch with her glass of honey whiskey, watching her colleagues ringed around Kara's dining table, buying houses and hotels, paying rent, rounding the corner, passing Go and collecting $200.

She was more of a Risk kind of gal: war, world domination, like that. She thought it amusing that Kara was most likely to pull out Monopoly when Lena wasn't available, knowing that Lena would wipe the floor with their asses if business was in the mix. Lucy didn't blame her.

As a Lane, dealing with Supers and Luthors was practically a family business in itself. But really, it was the Danvers sisters who most interested Lucy, the way they seemed to share a brain sometimes. The way Alex still looked at Maggie with a soft, lost look before looking at Vasquez who also looked lost and sad. There was a lot going on there, and she'd heard rumors, but knew better than to put stock in the DEO rumor mill. There was something about Alex at an offworld wedding and something else about Vasquez, on another Earth apparently, failing at her mission. Agents talked shit in their downtime as a way to pass the time between missions. Didn't mean anything.

She also noticed that Maggie's looks towards Alex were cautious, guarded, as if her heart were still at risk and she was protecting it. 

Alex, in her capacity as the soon-to-be director of the DEO, had asked Lucy if she wanted to come back to National City, but Lucy knew Vasquez would be Alex's first choice for Assistant Director, and Lucy couldn't fault her with that choice, knowing how those two also shared a brain sometimes. And if Lucy weren't going to be in the line of succession, she preferred to stay in charge of the Nevada site, at least for the time being. Maybe if she and Maggie started to think about the future, a future together or...

Better to watch her friends play Monopoly together than to try to predict and then pre-navigate the future. The future was an open road and anything could happen.

And given that this was National City? Anything probably would.


	2. Getting Back to (Our New) Normal

Alex rolled out of bed on the first day of August, determined. They had been back in National City for three weeks, but she had been so busy shuffling duty rosters and finishing up the third-quarter budget paperwork that she hadn’t had time—hadn’t made time—to sort out her own goals. But now she tied her running shoes and headed out the door of her apartment, starting at a slow jog down the street at 5:45, just as the dark was starting to lift from the city.

Clark’s wedding in Metropolis had gone better than she’d hoped—Cadmus and the repeated day shenanigans notwithstanding—and the Pride weekend had ended with herself and Vasquez back in a better place than she’d had any reason to hope for.

She took the small incline at a brisker pace before slowing for the hill up Archer Street. Her to-do list for the day included briefing J’onn about what they had discovered about this new version of Cadmus, liaising with Maggie about the graffiti she had texted—anti-alien slurs on the walls of the Luthor Alien Clinic—agility training for Krypto with Supergirl and Winn, and then maybe, possibly, hopefully, dinner with Vasquez?

She’d been watching YouTube videos on how to make quesadillas all week. Her first four attempts had been embarrassing, but the last two weren’t half bad. With any luck, tonight would be the charm.

///

The conference room at LCorp was overwarm and heavy with the first-chair lawyer’s cologne as he droned on about the PowerPoint of their case against LordTech. Lena Luthor was a strong woman, but it was eleven o’clock and she had been up with the sun, had forgotten to eat breakfast except for the cup of coffee Jess Huang had insisted on right before the meeting—God bless her—and so, thin, trim, fashionable Lena Luthor feared her stomach might start an embarrassing rumble any time now.

Which of course made her think of Kara. She smiled, thinking of their hotel room in Metropolis. Luckily, she had brought the portable red sunlight emitters with her for Clark’s wedding. It was one thing when Kara broke the headboard of the bed at Lena’s condo in National City. Explaining a broken headboard to a hotel concierge might have proved… challenging.

The lawyer at the front of the room faltered. “Er, Ms. Luthor?”

“Yes, George?”

“Er, you’re smiling.”

“Yes.”

“But, ma’am, this isn’t good news.”

“No,” she said, rising out of her chair, taking advantage of the opportunity to end the meeting. “But I have faith that you and your team will earn those high salaries we’re paying you. Maxwell Lord won’t know what hit him.”

Then she swept out of the room and headed down to R&D. It was time to do some real work.

///

Supergirl’s morning had been going well, right up until the rogue Infernian had decided to light up the park not far from LCorp. Supergirl tried not to take such things personally, but anything that might endanger Lena brought out her protective mode. She had been about to pummel the man but Vasquez on the comms in her ear said, “Supergirl, we talked about excessive use of force… Bring him in and let our agents handle this.”

“Sorry, Vasquez. It’s just that this is the fourth time since we’ve been back that somebody has been messing around in this neighborhood.” She flew into the DEO with the red-haired alien over her shoulder and laid him down on the floor of the command center for a trio of agents in black tacticals to take down to holding.

Vasquez stood with her hands on her hips, frowning--and Vasquez had A Frown for Every Occasion, all of which Alex knew categorically, but Kara really didn’t—so Supergirl stood looking nervous while agents pretended not to be impressed that their small human boss was terrifying the alien superhero. 

“Supergirl, if you’d think about pattern recognition, you’d realize that all the other attacks have been by humans, not aliens. This young man appears to be the equivalent of a teenager, and quite likely doesn’t have control over his powers yet. Not the same thing.”

“Oh! You’re right! It’s just that Lena has been so worried lately—”

“Supergirl, walk with me. I need to bring some paperwork down to Rose.”

The Kryptonian grinned. “I haven’t seen her in a while. We haven’t had to get decontaminated in—”

“Don’t say it,” said Vasquez quickly. “Don’t jinx us. The last thing we need is an ichor-spewing mutant.”

“Whoops! Sorry. Wow, I’m just screwing everything up today.”

“No, you’re not. Sometimes it’s just Wednesday and there’s nothing any of us can do about it.”

Which didn’t really make any sense, but Supergirl did feel a little better. She sighed. “I just wish we were back in Metropolis. Cadmus aside, it was a lot of fun.”

“You’re not wrong,” said Vasquez, looking thoughtful. “So. Tell me about Lena. You have concerns?”

“You know about her intellectual property battle against LordTech?”

“That’s been going on for a few years. I thought it was supposed to be an easy win.”

“That’s what they expected, but Lord has influenced some legislation, apparently…”

“Say no more.”

“He is such a blowhard annoying jerk-guy!”

Vasquez’s expression didn’t change. “I have heard that.”

“Anyway, it’s not just that. There’s problems with CatCo, apparently, profits are down, and since I know she bought it to save Cat’s baby but mainly for me…”

“Ah.”

“And since we got back she’s been working eighteen-hour days…”

“I see.”

“And Jess is great—”

“She is.”

“But. Well. Lena is struggling to sort it all out and I don’t know how to help.”

“Mm. Well, there’s always food. You’re good at that.”

“Oh, you’re right! I could get those crepes she likes so much from that shop on the Left Bank! What a great idea, Vasquez! You’re the best!”

And she left Vasquez in the wake of her superspeed.

///

Krypto followed Scruffy down the stairs—at least elebenty of them—to the training hall. It had steps and inclines and hoops and a narrow wall and every time they went through, it was a little different but he got a treat each time, and two if he managed to walk along the narrow wall without falling off.

And yay, treats!

But also, yay that the pack was back. They had all gone to see Kal El and his mate in Metropolis and had left him in charge of National City’s safety while they were gone, and he had worked very hard with the DEO agents patrolling the city and occasionally peeing on trees to ensure that the dogs of the city at least knew that he was on the job, protecting everybody.

But he was glad that Kara was back. The agents were generous with sharing their lunches, but they didn’t know much language: sit, stay, come, lie down. It was embarrassing. But maybe that’s why they hadn’t been asked to go on the mission to Metropolis. It made sense that Kara had left Krypto in charge. And thankfully, they hadn’t had any major disasters, probably because Spring Chaos was over. 

Apparently, the hotter weather put off criminals and terrorists and flying cats.


	3. What We See When We Look at What We Have

Winn led Krypto back to the command center and threw himself into his usual chair below the computer feeds, energized. Nearby, James was consulting with Alex and Vasquez about what level of threat the recent uptick of anti-alien violence might constitute. James still didn’t look completely at home in his black tacticals, but as Krypto settled himself on Winn’s right foot and immediately fell asleep, Winn thought that DEO agents like Alex and Vasquez were born, not made, and folks like James and himself simply had to slog their way toward that lofty goal at their own slow speeds.

Winn was happy to be back at work. He’d heard in the break room that crime had been slow while they had been away. Well, of course, all the excitement had been happening in Metropolis. His mind was still reeling about the repeated day shenanigans that the Legends had explained. Apparently, in at least one scenario, he had slept with Kara, and that was enough to boggle the mind. He knew about the multiverse theory, knew that it was true, knew that everything that was possible at all eventually happened somewhere, but he had just assumed that no universe actually held that as a possibility.

He pulled out his phone and scrolled through the list of alien restaurants that Kara had recently reviewed. Then he texted Jess Huang at LCorp.

ForTheWinn: Hey, Jess. Care to try out some Infernian barbecue some time? There’s a place not far from LCorp.

While he waited for a reply, a call came out and James followed Alex down to the armory. Krypto rolled over to Winn’s left foot.

JessIsBest: Tonight around 7 or not until next week. I’m slammed.

ForTheWinn: Tonight it is. If you need to cancel, I can get takeout and bring it to you.

JessIsBest: You’re my favorite. Cuz you know that will probably happen.

Winn blushed.

ForTheWinn: Vasquez has taught me about contingency planning. Look at their menu online and text me what you want.

This whole dating thing was relatively new to Winn, but if he’d learned nothing else from the wedding and Pride celebrations in Metropolis, it was that if he just showed up, as himself, and loved as hard as he could, things would probably work out.

///

Maggie was just getting out of her car to grab a burrito at No Way José’s when the call came: a possible hate crime in the warehouse district, not far from the Luthor Alien Clinic. With a gusty sigh, she got back in the car, hit the light and siren and sped across town. She barely had to navigate since she had done this route so much lately. Fox News blamed the uptick in violence on the Luthor Alien Clinic, of course it did, CNN called for better funding for the police Science Division, and Channel Seven/CatCo put the blame on the president’s dangerous anti-alien rhetoric.

Didn’t really matter who was to blame, though, thought Maggie. She and her people were always the ones called in to clean up the mess. She expected it to be the usual, some young man, green or purple, winged in a drive-by shooting, victim of spontaneous hatred.

But no.

The school bus had just let off a dozen elementary school kids, some human but most alien, when a truck came roaring down the hill, skidding out of control and plowing into them, rolling over on its side and exploding. It took out almost all of the children and the donut shop, as well as a telephone poll and the electricity for six blocks.

Just an accident then, although a horrifically tragic one. She saw Alex and James in their “FBI” jackets surveying the scene. James looked like he might vomit, but he was holding it together. The DEO’s crime techs were bagging and tagging while the Fire Department was covering the truck with foam. The fire was out but she could feel the heat off the truck from twenty feet away. They wouldn’t be getting evidence from there for a few hours at best. She looked around at roof level and saw several surveillance cameras. She called to an NCPD uniform and told him to pull the film and bring it to her at the precinct. Then she went to liaise.

Alex was pointing back to the black SUV and James hurried away. 

“Danvers, what’s your take on this? Tragic accident?”

“Detective, I truly hope that’s the case, but I just talked to a Fourian woman who had just come out of the donut shop where she was waiting to pick up her kids. She said she felt the malice so strongly that she ran outside in time to see the truck bearing down on the kids. She saved the only two survivors by pushing them away…”

“Right,” said Maggie. “Fourians are psychics. God, what a mess. How many victims?”

“Nine children, six of them aliens. The driver.”

“A suicide run? Who would kill kids that way? I mean, terrorists kill themselves to take out military bases, high value targets. Not kids.”

“That’s the theory, but you’re right. I agree that it makes no sense. So we’re going to look for a better answer. Winn and Lena had started on a scan of psychic pathways last year. I don’t know how far they got.”

The wind shifted and the smoke, even as the fires were being put out, smelled acrid and heavy, a combination, they both knew, of gasoline, the foam suppressant, and charred flesh. Maggie gagged and Alex put her hand on her sleeve. She put her other hand in one of her cargo pockets and pulled out a small tube of pale green. “Here, Maggie. Wasabi. If your nose is shut down, you can’t smell anything.”

Maggie took it gratefully, squeezed some of the horseradish sauce onto her tongue and felt her tongue and nose shut down. Small mercies.

“Hey,” said Alex softly. “We’ll figure this out. Come with me to St. Christopher’s. I want to talk to the principal, ID the kids, see if we can figure out a motive. You should take point, but I want to make it clear that we’re considering this a probable hate crime, so it’ll probably be federal unless we can prove it was just an accident. We need to present a united front on this, let the city know we are taking this shit seriously.”

///

James returned to the DEO, showered and changed into fresh tacticals, bringing the smelly ones down to Rose in Decontamination. She shook her head sadly and said she’d do her best. Then he went up to the command center to write his report. There were moments when he was glad to work here rather than back at CatCo, where he would have had to take pictures of the blaze, treating tragedy as spectacle to pay the rent. This was better.

“Hey, Winn, Alex said to ask you how far you and Lena got on a device to identify psychic activity.”

Winn shook his head. “Nowhere. Spring Chaos happened halfway through the process and then we just never got back to it.”

“Spring Chaos?”

“Oh, that’s the term Kara made up to explain to Krypto how we always seem to fighting some big bad or other in May.”

“We do, don’t we?” James shook his head. “Like clockwork.” He took in his friend’s happy look. Cleary, being behind the scenes had its benefits. Winn never had to see the worst of it when he so rarely went out into the field. It suited him. “So… how’s the agility training going?”

Krypto opened one eye and zipped over to James, his tail wagging so fast it was almost invisible.

“Guess your English is improving, boy!”

Winn laughed. “Yeah, because he knows the A word leads to T-R-E-A-T-S.”

James held out his open hands. “Sorry, Krypto, I don’t have anything for you.” 

Krypto sighed and went back to sit on Winn’s feet.

James said, “Hey, want to come over to play Call of Duty tonight?”

“Nah, I have a date with Jess!” Big grin.

“Right. Great. Date with Jess.”

“I know, right? Raincheck?”

“Of course.” But James felt like he had just been hit by a downpour.

///

In the few years he had lived in National City, Brian the blue alien had had a number of jobs, run a few side businesses (he refused the DEO's term for them, scams), and had been arrest-free for nearly a year when the Luthor Alien Clinic had been built. So he had jumped at the chance to get some education and make the most of his appearance and maybe do some good in the world.

The Alien Emergency Med Tech training had been arduous, but he'd made new friends who, like him, had found that their obvious alien origins were often held against them in other fields. But when aliens called an ambulance, they would actually be reassured rather than afraid to see that the responders were blue or green. Lena Luthor really was a genius.

They had been called out for the explosion, but the children, and the driver responsible, were "crispy critters" before he and his partner had even arrived, and Brian pretended to be just as jaded as his partner was, but he knew that, after work, he would be going directly to Dollywood where he could drink something very, very strong and--what was it the detective said? Lose his cool.

Because Brian knew that he wasn't the sharpest nut in the cookie jar, but he had a big heart.

///

Lillian Luthor's lawyers left her, smiling at the good news they had brought her, a plea deal that would take ten years off her sentence if she sold out her Cadmus contacts. It was a tempting offer, one she would seriously consider. To get more time to think it over, she told her lawyers of the Metropolis warehouse that had been their first base, which held computers with nonessential information, a few firearms and some explosives. Not much of course. And all left behind intentionally for just such a moment.

There would be a few arrests of low-level minions, which should win her some good will, make it look like she might be "learning her lesson" or maybe even "experiencing remorse." Excellent. It was always easier to fly under people's radar when they thought you were complying with them.

The lawyers had left behind a National City Tribune with a front-page story about the Lionel Luthor Alien Medical Clinic, written by the Danvers girl. Supergirl. She grimaced with distaste, but read it anyway. Forewarned was forarmed, though she had but two.


	4. Happy Returns of the Day—And the Other Kind

Cat Grant was back.

CatCo knew it. Lena Luthor knew it. And Kara "Supergirl" Danvers knew it. So, basically, everyone who needed to know, did. Excellent. That only left the rest of National City, the vast majority of whom didn't know how much democracy depended on the unbiased reporting of historical truth.

Or, to put it another way, Cat needed desperately to increase subscriptions and/or other forms of income to put the paper, magazine and website back in the black. Lena had, surprisingly, done a better job than James had--

\--okay, not so surprisingly. She had an MBA. He had an MFA. Never mind.--

Anyway, they were going to need out-of-the-box thinkers, and those weren't the kind of people James and his minions had been hiring over the previous year. Well, shit. Plan...C? D? Cat didn't even know. She emailed her brand manager and her CFO for a meeting. Then she asked Eva to get her a lettuce wrap and a triple cappuccino. She was in for a very long afternoon of work.

///

Millie Bernetti was first a chef, second a perfectionist, and third the wife of an alien, usually in that order. But not always. And anyway, the first two overlapped enough to be practically one category, so she didn't feel the need to feel guilty. She had three extraordinarily successful five-star restaurants in three cities. She had friends among the political and cultural elite--and also Lena Luthor, who herself pretty much composed the technical elite. And Millie knew that Lena, despite her xenophobic upbringing, was outspokenly pro-alien.

Millie was no spring chicken and no fool. She had met Kara Danvers. She was herself married to an alien. She knew what she was looking at, or who. Supergirl was a talented food critic, and Millie was the last person to call out a refugee, especially not one who had single-handedly increased their subscriptions by 11%. But Millie recognized the look on Lena's face the few times in the last year when they had been able to spend any significant amount of time together, and what she saw was loneliness.

So she had contacted Lena's ultra-capable assistant, to get an impregnable two-hour appointment with Lena. She had brought menus, her assistant and a few samples of wedding cake flavors that her brand was known for. 

Millie said, "Lena, you are a woman of good taste. I need your opinion for the wedding of an elite... well, I guess I can't say, professional ethics being an issue. But try a taste of each of these five different cakes. Tell me what you think. There is Interesting Vanilla Praline, Swiss Chocolate Almond, Strawberry Longcake, Pineapple Coconut, and Mango-Passionfruit."

Lena didn't bother to argue that she was always on a diet. There was no point with Millie. She simply tried a forkful of each one.

"No, yes, longcake?, ooh, and just no."

"So what about layers of the chocolate and the pineapple coconut?"

"Oh my--you do know that I'm an atheist, right?"

"Everybody has a weakness..."

"Why are you even asking me? Who is the wildly secret celebrity that you're working for?"

Millie shrugged. "I'm assuming that the couple I have in mind will come to me shortly. I just want to be prepared. Maybe a raspberry/chocolate?"

"Sure, maybe that. Or banana."

"Fewer folks like banana than you would think." Millie sighed.

"You seem down," said Lena.

"Kara Danvers is keeping my brand afloat. Times are rough. People are becoming narrow about life and culture, even food. Maybe especially food. Your Kara has been keeping our alien and alien-adjacent businesses afloat. But I think she doesn't realize how important she has been for this city. And I'm terrified that she will go back to straight journalism--you should forgive the phrase--and if she does, the food scene in National City, and maybe Metropolis and Gotham as well--will surely suffer."

"Mil, she's just one writer."

"Yeah, she is. But Dr. Oppenheimer was just one scientist."

"The bomb," said Lena. "'I am become death, the destroyer of worlds.'"

"Yup."

"Are we really in such a shite situation? I've been told the worst of the environmental catastrophe is still at least twenty to thirty years out."

"That's on the planetary scale. On the interpersonal scale, we are here: apocalypse now."

“Hm. Well, I’ll talk to her. Oh, do you know Fleur—”

“The one who makes the chocolate mousse Kara drools about?”

Lena smiled. “The very same. She came up with a version of a jalapeno chocolate cake layered with her mousse. I thought Kara was going to burst into tears when she tasted it.”

“Good to know. I will do some networking. But Lena, don’t be a stranger, okay?”

And Millie left Lena staring off into the distance and, hopefully, thinking about weddings.

///

On Thursday morning, Agent Susan Vasquez woke a few minutes before her alarm went off and absently rolled over to find that her dream about Alex Danvers coming home with her had been… just a dream. Growling, she rolled out of bed, onto the floor and did sit-ups, push-ups and planks, before throwing on her running clothes and sneakers, turning on the coffee maker and hurrying out the door to run a mile around her neighborhood, hurry back to shower, coffee and no real appetite for breakfast.

She recognized the signs of depression and knew she needed to see the DEO therapist soon. Things had mostly been better since Metropolis, but when she heard through the grapevine that Alex had asked Lucy Lane to come back to National City, a weight that she had thought dispelled had settled in the pit of her stomach. Alex didn’t trust her to be her Assistant Director.

Well, Vasquez couldn’t really blame her. Once she read the mission report on how Vasquez had royally fucked up her undercover mission at SHIELD, nearly getting the whole team killed and then getting Lost in Space with Daisy Johnson… Hell, Vasquez didn’t trust herself anymore. How could anybody else possibly trust her?

She drove to work, parked her Beetle in the sub-basement parking lot and took the stairs to the command center, arriving winded to find Winn half asleep at his station and Al—the Director pacing restlessly.

“Agent Schott,” said Vasquez. “You are relieved of the watch.”

He yawned and tried to hide it, rising from his station. “Agent Vasquez, you have the watch.” Then he dragged himself to the elevator, probably to crash in the men’s barracks.

She didn’t know why he so often pulled the night watch. He complained about it enough, but he certainly had enough seniority—and pull—to be able to avoid it if he wanted. She suspected insomnia. Winn, like most of their best agents, had a history of trauma. Sometimes being on duty in the darkness was the only way to make the darkness stand down.

She sat down at her station and checked her to-do list.

• Check in with Livewire and get Dr. Hamilton’s assessment of her field readiness.  
• Meet with Pam in HR to get Livewire’s paperwork sorted out.  
• Lunch with Callie at the Luthor Alien Clinic.  
• Brief Director Danvers re: the above.

And she realized that this would likely be her last briefing as Acting Assistant Director. Her heart sank.

///

Supergirl strode into the command center at midmorning to bring the women coffee from Noonan's. Vasquez looked like she was about to cry when she took her cup, and at first, Supergirl thought it was just because she’d gotten the Toasted Almond, and as much as Vasquez was a butch Marine, she really loved her “girly flavored coffee” as Alex called it.

But then Alex also looked upset, absently rubbing the slight lump under her own black supersuit (as her sister thought of it), right above her heart.

“Alex, were you injured?” Supergirl used her x-ray vision to check for injuries, and realized that the lump was the plastic rainbow ring Vasquez had given Alex, hanging on a chain around her neck under her suit.

“What? No. Ooooh. Coffeee. You are a lifesaver.”

“Peppermint or wintergreen?”

“Both. I don’t know how J’onn managed to squeeze necessities like good coffee into our ever-shrinking budget.” She took a long sip and looked semi-orgasmic. Supergirl looked away, catching the fleeting look of longing on Vasquez’s face.

Supergirl took note but said, “You mean in between the inessential things like kryptonite bullets?”

“Exactly.”

Vasquez said lightly, “I’m pretty sure he was sneaky about it. The coffee went under foreign medicinal supplements, i.e., Columbian caffeine, and the potstickers were beaker insertion units.”

Alex laughed. “You’re right. I’d forgotten about that. Amazing. Three hundred years as a bureaucrat and he still has a sense of humor about it.”

Suddenly, Supergirl’s head snapped up. “OH, SH—Get a team on the ground! I’ll radio the location. Alert fire—” Then there was a whoosh of air and she was gone.

///

Papers fluttered off Vasquez’s station.

Alex said, “Let’s go!”

But Vasquez said, “Director, you need to stay here and QB. I’ll go! Finn, Holtzy, you’re with me!”

Alex felt lost watching them run out. She looked at the computer feed and saw nothing unusual, but she called down to Winn in the men’s barracks and he came running, looking mussed and half asleep, with his knit tie askew.

“Reporting for duty, Director Danvers, ma’am. What’s the sitch?”

“I don’t know. Supergirl smelled fire and flew off. Vasquez is taking a team.”

“If it’s just a fire, why do we—”

“I don’t know but Supergirl said get a team together so she must have smelled more than smoke.”

Winn typed away at his computer and the map on the screen above his head changed to—literally—a heat map. A portion of the theater district, just west of the finance district, was showing red dots growing in size.

“Oh, that’s not good…”

Alex came and stood behind him looking up. “Wait, that’s Alien Alley.”

“Holy sh—If I’m not wrong. That is Jupiter’s Feast, and the place next door is Millie Bernetti’s restaurant, and that’s—”

“Call Maggie. That’s either one very coincidental set of fires or it’s serial arson, targeting aliens.”

///

If Supergirl had gotten there five minutes later, the whole neighborhood would have burned to the ground, or at least that’s what the fire chief told her later. Her freeze breath kept the fires contained, so yes, three out of the five restaurants burned to the ground, and two were badly damaged. But it could have been much worse. A dozen ambulances raced to the scene, including two from the Alien Ambulance Corps. 

///

Maggie had her light and siren on but couldn’t get from her precinct to the theater district. She tried sidestreets, even drove on a sidewalk at one point but it was no use. The entire city was gridlocked. Maggie called Alex and let her know. The DEO and all three hospitals sent in helicopters, and Alex called out M’gann and J’onn to help Supergirl transport victims.

In the end, the only people who actually made it to the hospitals were the ones who were taken by air. More than a dozen aliens and three humans died en route. In her police report, Maggie recommended an investigation into the construction companies whose trucks had blocked the roads. The whole thing just stank of Cadmus.


	5. Running on Fumes

Vasquez set the Blackhawk down on the helipad on top of the DEO building, told Finn and Olsen to stand down and write up their mission reports while she finished post-flight checks and hauled herself down to the command center, exhausted. The city’s traffic pattern hadn’t been that fucked up since the Battle of National City with the Daxamites creating chaos. And nothing got that fucked up in National City without outside help. It wasn’t Boston, after all, planned after cow-paths.

When she arrived at the command center, J’onn and M’gann in their street clothes were standing talking to Alex and Supergirl. They looked just as tired and worried as she felt. They had done the trickiest of the extrications, directly from traffic to the hospitals.

M’gann said, “And when I landed at the Alien Ambulance, one of the nearby drivers had a case of road rage and I had to bring Brian to the Luthor Clinic as well.”

Vasquez came up to them. “Those burns were bad, Alex. And our people are only minimally trained for med-evac.”

J’onn frowned. “I talked to the fire chief about the accelerant used. He said it looks like one that’s been used in Gotham: once it ignites, it burns long and hard. In fact, freeze breath is one of the only things that stops it once it gets going. Whoever did this was going for maximum damage.”

“Damage to aliens,” growled Kara. “And worse than that, damage to alien restaurants. I feel like this is personal.”

Vasquez nodded slowly. “Do we think Cadmus? And M’gann, you might want more security at Dollywood. I can give you a referral.”

“Thanks, good idea. Actually, you’re all welcome to come down tonight. First round's on me.”

Alex was looking at her sister, concerned. “I know you want to pound someone, Supergirl, but let’s investigate this thoroughly. Do we know that Lillian is still locked up?”

“Yes,” said Vasquez, who had already checked.

J’onn said, “Don’t worry, Director Danvers. You’ve got this.”

“Oh, I sure hope so.”

Vasquez could feel the waves of worry pouring off her as Alex went back into J’onn’s—into her new office. Vasquez turned back to Supergirl and the Martians. “Supergirl, you need to write up your report and give me a separate page or so of your initial gut reactions, what you saw, what you heard, anything that might be important or unimportant, while you still remember. And J’onn and M’gann, would you accompany me down to Pam in HR? I want to make sure your deputations are up to date. I’m afraid we might be needing to call you out more than usual for a while, at least until we know who is behind all this.”

///

Pam in HR kept her nails polished, her ear to the ground and a plate of homemade cookies on her desk—oatmeal chocolate chip for preference—so she was always ready for anything. When Vasquez and the Martians came in, she handed Vasquez four folders.

“I’m way ahead of you, Susan. One for you, J’onn, M’gann, and Livewire.”

Vasquez frowned. “Wait, but—”

“Finn came to tell me about the deputations after your mission, so I could prep the paperwork.”

“Yes, that’s like him. But I meant—”

“You asked me about Livewire on Monday, and I just got the paperwork from Dr. Hamilton, okaying her for training and light fieldwork.”

“Yes, but I meant, what is this for me?”

“Your promotion.”

Vasquez stared. “What promotion?”

“To Assistant Director? Your new contract, your raise?”

“But I’m only Acting Assistant Director.”

“Yes, until you sign that paper.” Pam handed her a pen.

Vasquez stood there, folder in one hand and pen in the other, looking like she didn’t know how they worked. “But it’s not me. It’s Lucy, Major Lane. I know Alex asked her.”

“Um, no? Director Danvers asked her to take over our training program, but Major Lane prefers to remain in Nevada.”

J’onn tried not to smile, and M’gann carefully turned away to sign the forms in her own folder.

Pam said, “Didn’t Director Danvers already discuss this with you? I’m pretty sure she said she had.”

“No, the only discussions we had about it were right after Alura's funeral and right before the wedding, but it was only about the interim…”

J’onn and Pam were both frowning. J’onn said, “I know Alex isn’t always the best communicator, Agent Vasquez, but it was always clear to me, both explicitly and telepathically, that you are the only person she even considered for the job. I believe her words were, ‘She’s the only one who I know will always have my back.’”

“She. But. I. But who’s going to do Threat Assessment?”

“Ah, yes. I asked her that too. She said, ‘It’s not like we could stop her if we tried.’”

Pam allowed herself a chuckle. “That’s accurate, Vas. Now, if everybody would give me your John Hancocks, you can each have a cookie. Then go get out of my hair.”

///

When Dr. Callie Torres got to the bar, she was practically dead on her feet, but also abuzz from working off adrenaline all afternoon. She could see that in the faces of the DEO agents she recognized as she pushed her way to their usual table.

Dollywood was crowded that night, as often happened whenever the alien community was targeted in any way. All of the bartending staff came in without being asked, just like the residents and attendings not on call had come in to the Luthor Alien Clinic as soon as they could when they heard about the fires.

Alex, Kara, Vasquez and Maggie were sharing a booth, but Kara sweet-talked a chair from someone blue when she saw Callie and set it at the end of the table. Callie sank into it gratefully, and then someone handed her a double scotch. Not for the first time, she was also grateful for her psychic bartender. She took a long sip and swallowed, appreciating the burn as it went down. 

Maggie turned to her. “How did it go at the clinic today, doc?”

“I worked my ass off, but the burn unit had it worse. I just had to deal with the firemen who were under the stairway that collapsed at Jupiter’s Feast. Broken arms, ribs.”

Alex said, “But you’ll be helping them out too, won’t you, with the prosthetics and skin grafts?”

“Yeah, but that’s in the lab, not the OR. Much less traumatic.”

Vasquez shook her head. “Better you than me. I could never be surgeon. Terrifying.”

“Says the woman who rappels out of helicopters,” murmured Callie.

Vasquez waved that away. “Pfft. Anyway, Alex, when were you going to tell me that I was graduating to official for-real Assistant Director of the DEO?”

“Huh? Wasn’t it obvious? Why wouldn’t you? You do want to, don’t you?”

Callie grinned at the shocked look on Lexie—on Alex’s face.

Vasquez sighed. “Of course, I do, but why didn’t you tell me?”

“But I did. I said, Vas, you’ll be my AD, won’t you? And you said yes.”

“But they made me Acting Assistant Director when they made you Acting Director.”

“Yeah, that’s just HR stuff to make the transition easier on payroll or something. Ask Pam. I was too busy learning the ropes from J’onn to figure out the paperwork of it.”

Callie shook her head. Alex was still a little clueless about some things. Changing the subject, she said, “Brian got brought into the clinic too. He got beat up while the ambulance was caught in traffic. We’re seeing a lot more of that these days.”

“Yeah, we’re looking into that, and that bus accident,” said Alex.

“Look faster,” said Kara darkly. “Somebody needs to be pummeled.”

And Callie didn’t laugh even though the pale pink shirt with little flamingos all over it took a lot of the danger out of the threat. She finished her scotch, put down a twenty. “I’m beat. I’m calling it a day.”

And she left, still musing about the mix of personalities that was the Danvers sisters.


	6. Room for Recovery

Millie was just stepping off a plane from Metropolis when she first learned the news. She was walking past an airport bar and looked up at the news on the big TV screen, saw the flames, kept walking, then walked past another bar and recognized the street where the flames were burning. Then she recognized the smoking ruin of her restaurant. Then she passed out.

She woke up in National City General Hospital’s Emergency Room, explained to the nurse about her restaurant, and how her business trip had gone longer than she had expected and she hadn’t brought enough of her blood pressure medication along. She gave them her wife’s phone number and practiced deep breathing techniques while waiting for her. 

When the thin red-haired woman arrived with her pill bottle, Millie took her dose and said, “How bad is it?”

Audrey looked exhausted. “Total loss. I’ve already talked to the insurance people and referred them to NCPD, who have said it looks like a hate crime. Jupiter’s Feast went down too, and the Saturnalia. Luckily Supergirl got there in time to save the rest of the street.”

“Was anybody hurt?”

“Chef George has bad burns, but Supergirl flew him directly to the hospital, and they said that made all the difference, that and her freezing his arm. We didn’t lose anybody. Artzy lost two waiters.”

“Who?”

“Steve and B’nar. As far as I heard, everybody else was mostly smoke inhalation and a couple of firefighters were hurt when a staircase collapsed.”

“That’s a bloody miracle.”

“Well, Cassie said she was outside, ha, on her smoke break and saw the smoke and pulled the signal, but Supergirl was already on her way, got there a few seconds later.”

“I’m surprised that someone pulled this off in the middle of the day. Don’t most fires like that happen at night?”

“You got me. I called Lena. She said you should drop by LCorp.”

“I’ll do that, but first we need to go home. I’m too old for shocks like this.”

///

In the conference room at the DEO, Fire Chief Martin Short took in the new Director, a woman with reddish hair, looked a little queer, big difference from that Jones fellow. Just great.

“Your conclusions, Chief?”

“Well, Miss—”

And the shorter woman with the boy’s haircut next to her growled, “It’s Director to you.”

“Er, Director. Sure. Anyway. Yes, clearly a hate-crime-motivated arson. Somebody tapped into the neighborhood’s water supply, probably the night before and laced the accelerant into it. When the smoke detectors went off, they were spraying the stuff everywhere.”

“That’s diabolical,” muttered Danvers.

“And I am trying to keep that information from getting out. Last thing we need is copy cats.”

“I concur. Not that that could be easy to do, I’d think.”

“It gets worse. We have several aliens who live and work in the neighborhood found dead that night. Apparently they drank it.”

“So this is arson and mass murder? What about the results on the truck v. bus the other day?”

“The coroner found a device implanted in the truck driver. He said it looked like one of those LordTech prosthetics people got after the Daxamite battle. We’re looking into it.”

“Because it failed? Or because it succeeded?”

He gave her a second look. She might be deviant but she wasn’t dumb. “Either way. Right now that’s all we’ve got.”

“I see. Thank you for coming, Chief. Don’t let me detain you.”

///

Jess Huang got a ping about the Alien Alley arson in the news, watched the footage of the NCFD fighting the fires, with red and blue, and green flashes in the background as the homegrown heroes fought the traffic gridlock to get the victims to the city's hospitals, including the Luthor Alien Clinic, which was why she got the ping. She felt faint, but she was made of sturdy stuff, so she kept calm and called people who would want to be making appointments with Lena in the wake of this latest tragedy: Millie Bernetti, Cat Grant, Alex Danvers.

Kara Danvers.

Probably Meghan from the alien bar. Definitely Kate and Ron from R&D. Possibly that Dr. Torres from the clinic. Quite likely Winn...

And thoughts of him did distract Jess for a hot minute, because they had sat in the conference room only a few days back, eating Infernian barbecue between Jess's late meetings, and he was sweet and nice and nerdy, and she found herself liking him more and more.

And she was learning to love alien cuisine. So this? This attack on aliens and their culture and food and way of life? And lives?

Oh, Jess was pissed. And people, bad people, domestic terrorists might think that they knew what they were facing when they went up against the US government, the Luthors and the Supers.

But they had no fucking idea what they would face if they ever angered a Huang.

//

Cat's meeting with the CatCo Board of Directors was interrupted with news of the arson fires downtown in the theater district. Cat immediately recognized the importance of spinning the story and was about to put her resident alien reporter on it when she realized that Kara didn't actually work for her anymore, Snapper was still on medical leave, and James had gone to play GI Joe with the DEO. So she went and did the interviews herself.

Probably just as well. It would give the piece éclat for her to deign to do the reporting herself. With subscriptions and readership down, it made sense for her to lend a hand where she could.

///

Detective Maggie Sawyer, NCPD Science Division, was looking at the board with some dismay. They had pictures of the victims and perpetrator of the truck/schoolbus crash, lists of purveyors of the fuel the truck was carrying and the resume of the driver, along with the ID number of his titanium smart synthetic shoulder prosthetic, which had apparently been hacked from a short distance right before the accident. Uniforms were currently scraping video from the truck's route to see if they could find some visual somewhere of someone pushing a kill switch, but so far, no luck.

Maggie's phone buzzed. She picked it up.

FastLane: I assume you are working the schoolbus and arson cases?

HuckFinn: Duh.

FastLane: Got space in your bed for a long weekend?

HuckFinn: Duh. Again.

FastLane: What can I bring from Nevada?

HuckFinn: Um, the heat?

FastLane: I like how U think.

///

M'gann was taking inventory when the black woman in black pantsuit and white shirt walked into her bar.

"What can I get you?" she asked automatically, even though she thought she knew the answer.

The woman looked down at her phone. "Um, Meghan Morse? I'm Sophie Moore."

"I'm Meghan. I'm assuming you know about the anti-alien violence here in National City?"

"Absolutely. I talked at length with Agent Susan Vasquez about what sort of security you might need here. She mainly emphasized perimeter security, but I was wondering about background checks for your employees and some way to screen your clientele beyond the 'Joe sent me' level."

"I appreciate the first, but I've been doing this for dec-- years and never had the Joe strategy fail me."

"All you need is one first time. And, sorry to say this, but I've done my due diligence. You did have that fail you, what? Two years? A year and a half back? I read the news clippings about the alien pogrom."

"Shit. Yes, of course. The mind, the heart, they want to forget. What do you suggest?"

Sophie sat down at the bar, pulling out her tablet and tapping on it. "It's complicated, as you point out, a tradeoff between security and civil liberty. We can scan driver's licenses, which is still iffy, and they can be counterfeited, obviously. We can bring in mind-readers, but that is also a potential civil liberties problem."

Meghan sighed. "Okay, come up with a menu of possibilities. Lena Luthor has offered a few hours of her lawyers' time for this because we're her watering hole. And that's another reason for me to keep my bar safe. The people who come here are... important, whether they're targeted aliens or ally millionaires."

Sophie was privileged enough that her jaw did not drop.

///

Eve Tessmacher walked into the break room at CatCo to refill her water bottle, and as the cold water poured, she watched her coworkers with their paper cups of coffee and seethed. The fucking world was burning and people still insisted on pouring their drinks into single-use paper and plastic, pretty much ensuring that humans would in fact cause their own sixth extinction and take all of the animals with them. As an environmentalist vegetarian, Eve took this shit personally.

These thoughts distracted her from her true purpose, however, so she took a deep breath and let them go. She made a show of taking the ice cube tray (which only she ever used) out of the freezer while listening to her coworkers complain about the increased traffic and decrease in jobs and blame it all on the influx of aliens in National City.

Eve plucked three cubes from the tray with her long nails and dropped them into her water bottle.

She said, "And then there was that alien selling those vitamin supplements last year, the ones that turned people green--"

And Eve smiled as she walked back to her desk. It wasn't hard to twist the conversation in the direction you wanted and then let people fill in the gaps themselves. Lex had been right about that little Gestalt trick.

///

It was a miracle, really, Jess Huang thought later. Not a Deus Ex Machina lightning bolt from the sky type, but an unremarkable chain of events, the kind that led to the presence of a horseshoe nail that led to a hopeless battle--the kind that could change history--being won when every possible other outcome meant it should have been lost.

They had walked into Dollywood holding hands--and when had Jess ever held hands with a guy in public? Never?--and Winn was grinning from ear to ear. It was a little odd to see the human in black tacticals, with a Crow Security patch, standing by the door, but in retrospect, she supposed it was no surprise. The woman had scanned their IDs with some device and let them go through.

Winn wondered aloud what the device was and whether they had one back at... er, "work." Jess rolled her eyes. His beer and her white wine came without them having to ask for it, and just as the waiter was setting the drinks down, a text came through on Winn's phone. Jess sipped her Chardonnay, waiting while Winn texted back and forth with whoever. Then he put his phone down and stared off into middle distance, clearly thinking, possibly even inventing. Jess was familiar with the look, and drank more of her drink.

"You need to go back to work, don't you?" she said, with no judgment--their jobs were their jobs, and neither one of them would have changed them--and a little disappointment.

"Yes... But only to pick some things up and drop them off to Lena at the clinic. They have an alien patient who needs surgery, but the only way to anesthetize them is a sonic-- Anyway, the point is they need a sonic bomb, more or less, and for the surgeons, they need those earbuds I developed to thwart Reign..."

"My boyfriend uses the word 'thwart' in a sentence," said Jess fondly.

"Wait, I'm your boyfriend? Was I supposed to change my Facebook relationship status?"

"Well, Winn, it is the twenty-first century after all."

"I'll so do that after I do this. I'm sorry about our date being cut into."

She indicated her empty glass and tossed a twenty on the table. "I'm good. Let's go."

And Winn's car was a Mini-Cooper, of course it was. And he drove quickly and carefully back to the DEO, and parked in the sub-basement parking lot, and she stayed in the car while he picked up the devices he needed. Then they crossed town to the warehouse district and parked on the street across from the Luthor Alien Clinic, and Jess led him through the front door and up the elevators to the sixth floor and followed the arrows to the surgical unit, where Jess showed her ID to the security guy, who let them through.

Lena, Callie and two men in scrubs were standing in front of the whiteboard that listed the surgeries. There was only one for that night. Lena lit up when she saw them.

"Winn, thank you so much. This came up suddenly. It was a motor vehicle accident, but the patient is a species that bleeds more by day, so they have to--"

And Winn said, "Oh, you don't need to tell me--"

And Callie was citing the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, which had privacy issues--

And then there was a small explosion. The three doctors threw themselves to the right. Winn, Jess and Lena threw themselves to the left. The lights went out, and the emergency lights went on, and Jess immediately closed her eyes to acclimate faster, grabbed Lena's arm with one hand and Winn's with her other and dragged them after her toward the stairs. She knew she had an iron grip. They had to follow.

Lena huffed, "If this is Lex's annual assassination attempt--"

Winn said, "We should call Supergirl--"

But Jess rushed them down to the first floor. If they could just squeeze past the pharmacy, they could be out the door across the street from Winn's car--

But no.

The moment they exited the stairway they heard voices that sounded drunk and loose, talking about the "bitch-ass drugs the greenies take to get hella high," and heard the sound of several people stumbling down the hallway toward them, Jess knew she had to act.

"Winn," she whispered. "We're going to need those earplugs now! Give me the sonic anesthetizer. Lena, do you have the red sunlamp in your bag? Please say yes!"

And Winn handed her the tools and Lena, blushing, handed her the grenade-shaped sunlamp. They stuffed the plugs in their ears. Then Jess dialed the sonic device down and hit the strobe feature on the lamp.

A siren and rotating red lights filled the hallway. Lowering her voice, Jess yelled, "NCPD! Come out with your hands up!"

Shouts of distress. A half a dozen people scrambling for the exit. Doors slamming. She turned off the devices, pulled the plugs out of her ears.

"Excellent. Now we can let the doctors do their work."

Winn's heart eyes were huge. "You. Are. Awesome."

Lena said, "You need another raise. I'll get right on that tomorrow morning."

And Jess thought, they're not wrong.


	7. Fixing What's Broken

Cat Grant had her driver let her off at the side of the Luthor Clinic, rather than the patient entrance, so that she would be closer to the conference room where the Board would be meeting. Lena had texted her, asking her to cancel everything so she could be at the emergency meeting, and Cat knew that Lena didn't panic.

Ever.

Well, neither did Cat Grant.

(Well, except for that one moment a few years back when RedK Supergirl had tossed her over the balcony of her office and she'd been plummeting toward the ground. But anybody would have taken that badly, so she didn't feel guilty about it.)

In general, Cat didn't panic. She didn't react. She showed the hell up.

She made her way up to the conference room on the top floor radiating confidence, and even when a crowd of people was hurrying in the other direction, they parted like the Red Sea to let her pass through.

Of course they did.

The conference room was full of humans and aliens. She nodded to the ones she knew: Millie Bernetti, the alien chef from Jupiter's Feast (who looked exhausted), a few others. Then Lena Fucking Luthor swept in, wearing a dark green dress and four-inch heels and the murmured conversation ground to a halt.

"Hello, good morning. Thank you for coming. Last night we had a break-in. Some human hooligans decided to see if they could find some alien drugs. They blew the lock off the back door and shot up the pharmacy, stole a few things that are likely to make them very sick indeed, and put myself and several of our doctors at risk."

Shock made people shout, Cat knew, but after two minutes of panicked reacting from both sides of the table, Cat said quietly, "So, Lena. How should we have avoided that and what is your plan going forward?"

"Thank you, Cat. Cutting to the chase as always. I have liaised with NCPD and the... local FBI and they both recommend the same thing. Adding private security."

"That'll be expensive," said one man Cat didn't recognize.

"Hm," said Cat. "More expensive than the lawsuit if we can't protect our patients from identifiable threats? Hate crimes are on the rise. Don't you read the news? Anti-alien sentiment means we are a magnet for such problems."

"I agree," said Lena. "I have spoken with the Crows' director, and she gave me some options..."

And after that, the rest was just PowerPoint, so Cat sat back and let Lena run the show. The Board members were putty in the Luthor's elegant hands.

///

Vasquez sat at her station with a Moleskine notebook open next to her keyboard, but she was watching the computer feeds above Winn's head and letting her mind wander. She flipped through pages, noting the dates she had written things: before and after the Daxamites.

Before and after Reign.

Before she'd gone off on that hopelessly messy undercover mission with SHIELD.

After she'd returned, defeated.

She looked at that, the top of the page saying, "FLYING MONKEYS??? There's no place like home..."

And at the bottom of the page:

Something something I can't remember  
When the small rain doth rain.  
Christ, that my love were in my arms  
And I in my bed again! (16th century? author?)

Oddly, in the two-inch space she had left after those lines were two small circular discolorations, as if water had been dripped there.

As if... tears.

Vasquez took a cold, hard breath. Alex had read the notebook she had left behind. Alex had seen the lines of the poem she had misremembered... and shed tears.

Somehow, Vasquez had to make this right.

///

Supergirl flew fast over National City, ignoring the light rain, looking for trouble. From that height, the devastation of Alien Alley was like a gut punch--the blackened remains of three restaurants that she loved, places where she had eaten alone or with her editor Cassie DeWitt. Places she had planned on taking Lena, but somehow with all the fallout from Reign, they had never gotten around to it.

She slowed as she thought about all the things she wanted to do with Lena. She knew that Kryptonians lived longer than humans, even without the influence of the yellow sun. With all the crises in their lives, it would be very easy to just let one day slide into the next and not do the important things. She knew Lena wanted kids eventually. Supergirl wasn't sure how they would fit child-raising around superheroing, but if it was important to Lena, she would find a way to do it. She just had to fit in marrying her first.

And that's when, for the first time in the years since she'd come out as the Girl of Steel, Supergirl flew right into a building.

///

Winn was on the comms when he heard the explosion. "Supergirl! What is it? Terrorists? Is it Cadmus? Are you under attack?"

He could hear people screaming and glass breaking. He turned to Vasquez. "Go!"

She took off like a shot.

"Supergirl!" he yelled. "Where are you!"

"Ow! National City--ah... Bank and Trust. Um, sorry, what floor is this?"

Winn stared at the computer screen above his head, which he toggled to show the map of National City. The bank's skyscraper was not far from the theater district and Alien Alley.

"Was it terrorist? More anti-alien attacks?"

"No, just inattention while flying. And, oh, Winn, this is going to be expensive for the DEO. I am just so fuc--oh, ow. Can you, we're going to need J'onn to hold up, oh Rao..."

And that didn't sound good. Winn called J'onn and relayed Supergirl's location to him and to Vasquez. Then he put a call in to Dr. Hamilton downstairs in medical. If Supergirl was swearing, she was probably in a lot of pain.

///

Alex was pacing in Dr. Hamilton's office when Vasquez brought a dented Supergirl down to the yellow sunlamps, made her lie down, then went to report.

"Vas, what happened? Is she all right?"

"Terminally embarrassed, but otherwise, she'll heal. Apparently she had a major epiphany while flying and crashed. Luckily, J'onn says the damage wasn't structural, just a lot of broken glass and a banged up floor. Cuts and bruises on a few bankers, but she let them take selfies with her and she's offered to pay for the damage."

"Did she say what the epiphany was?"

"No, but I'd put money on it having something to do with Lena."

Dr. Hamilton chuckled. "Should we prepare for another wedding?"

"That would be my bet," said Vasquez.

Alex stared at them. Then she closed her mouth, thought about it for a moment, and said, "Vas, I think I'm going to need a raincheck on our dinner plans. She'll be freaking out, and there's only so much the infrastructure of this city can take."

Then she marched out looking determined.

Vasquez watched her go, sighing sadly. "Yeah, raincheck."

Dr. Hamilton crossed her arms and said quietly, "Are you two back together or not? And I should tell you in advance that I don't have any money in the pool on this one."

"Probably? Maybe? We're finding our footing."

"Fair enough. Two thoughts. One, help her help her sister. Two, food. The Danvers girls are very consistent about what they need and how they recognize love. Cook for them."

"Yeah, you're right about that. But for this first bit, if we're right? Alex needs to do this alone. They haven't been spending nearly enough time together since Reign. With Alex taking over the DEO, she's been overworking and they both have the Danvers Ethic of Overwork."

Dr. Hamilton smiled sadly. "Yeah. That other DEO."

///

Kara had changed back into her street clothes, her face a bit flushed from the sunlamps when Alex walked in. "Your place or mine?" Alex asked.

"Mine. But could you drive? I'm still a little..."

"Sure. C'mon."

Alex liked when Kara rode behind her on her motorcycle. It was a little bit like flying with her, but in reverse. Kara's grip was firm but careful, and when she parked in front of Kara's apartment, Kara let go with a deep sigh.

"C'mon, Kara. We can order takeout and just talk."

But when they got up to 4A, Vasquez was standing in the hallway with a stack of pizzas in her arms. "Hey, guys, I'm not trying to horn in, but I figured you'd need food and Giorgios was on my way home..."

"Vasquez, you're the best!" said Kara with a huge grin.

Alex gave her a grateful smile and squeezed her arm affectionately.

The sisters came into the loft, closed the door behind them. Kara carried the pizza boxes over to her island and lifted lids. "Ooooh. Hawaian, Veggie, and Peppers & Pepperoni. She knows us well."

"Yeah, she does. She thinks you had an epiphany about Lena."

"Fu-- Fudge. Am I that obvious?"

"Maybe. Just a little. So you figured out you loved her?"

"Oh, no. I've known that forever. I just realized I had to marry her."

"Okay."

"And you need to be my best person, and Mom and Astra and SpaceDad have to sort of give me away, although that's not really how it worked on Krypton."

"I wonder what Lena will want to do about that. It's not like she has family."

"Oh, you're right. This might get... complicated." Her face fell.

"Don't worry, Kara. I'm pretty sure all weddings are complicated. Mom always says that the best indication of a good marriage is that you survive planning the wedding together."

"Makes sense." She got down two plates and they piled pieces on top and went and sat on the couch. "What about you, Alex? Have you ever given any thought..."

"To marriage? A wedding? I used to. Before. But since the White Canary Incident, my mind has skittered away from any thought of weddings."

"You never thought about you and Vasquez...?"

"Oh, well. Just once, when we got all dressed up and went out for Valentine's, you know, after..."

"After the imp tried to fuck with my life? I recall."

"Don't let Mom hear you talk like that."

"I won't. It's just been a hell of a week, and now I have to plan an engagement."

"You mean how you'll ask her?" Alex picked off a dangling piece of pepperoni and popped it into her mouth.

"Yeah, that. Plus find someone to make the bracelet and see if we can find a recipe at the Fortress of Solitude for the dessert."

"Your people didn't use rings?"

"Rings are for the wedding." Kara finished her piece of Hawaian, then frowned. "What if she says no?"

"Why would she?"

"Oh, you know Lena's bad self-esteem issues, and the whole Luthors-are-evil thing."

"Well, then, you will simply have to be persuasive. Also, stop flying into buildings. Promise?"

"Promise. But I'm bushed. I'm going to call it a night. You should go say thank you to Vasquez." She wiggled her eyebrows.


	8. What We Do When We Can't Sleep

Kara showered and put on her white yummy sushi pajamas and lay in bed watching the lights from the cars strobe over her ceiling. She remembered her cousins' weddings on Krypton in the Palace of Love, with the red sunlight shimmering through the tall windows. She had now been on Earth longer than she had lived on Krypton, and to publicly marry Lena Luthor, she could not advertise her alien origins, not at the wedding. But an engagement was a private matter, something very intimate, and for that, she wanted to offer Lena as much of who she was as she could. Lena deserved that.

It had been hard after the whole Reign fiasco, to watch Lena curl into herself a bit. She missed Sam and Ruby, but everyone recognized the cathartic nature of a new start in a new city. And Kara had been so busy helping with the transition at the DEO that maybe she had been scarcer than she meant to be. And to be sure, that distance was precisely what had just made her realize how much she needed Lena Luthor, not just on the periphery of her life, but at the center of it. Lena was her heart.

She rolled over on her side, but sleep eluded her. Winn had taken Krypto home with him, because tomorrow they would be traveling to Metropolis to give Clark some experience with running Krypto through the agility training in case they ever had an emergency like that (Vasquez's idea, of course). Kara missed having him, a warm bundle of fur at her feet. But the change would do him good.

Finally she gave up on sleep, got up and brought her laptop to the island. She could at least send out a few emails, get the ball rolling.

KDanvers: Hey, Cat. I need a recommendation. Do you know any really good jewelers, like the kind that make jewelry? Thanks.

KDanvers: Dear Ms. Bernetti, I need to talk to you about a particular alien dessert. If I found the recipe for it, could you help me source the ingredients or figure out replacements? It's for a very special occasion. I might need help cooking it too... Thank you very much.

She thought about emailing Clark, but that was a conversation better done in person, and if he was going to be working Krypto for the first time it would be better if he didn't have any distractions.

Absently, she ate another piece of the veggie pizza. Then she wiped off her fingers and typed one more email.

AgentPotsticker: Hey Jess, I need a favor. Can you look at Lena's schedule this week and find a time for her to join me for dinner? And maybe could you book us a reservation at the sushi place she loves so much? It's really important. Thank you.

Finally she felt like she might actually be able to sleep. And she knew she would dream about Lena.

///

Vasquez watched Madam Secretary reruns on Netflix, longing for the days of President Marsden's solid, thoughtful, uninflammatory rhetoric. They were being run off their feet by all the anti-alien domestic terrorists, and it was just horrible. And unnecessary. And exhausting.

But it was one in the morning and she couldn't sleep. Her phone pinged and she looked down to see a text from Alex.

DirectorD: You awake?  
AgentKevlar: Yeah. You want to come by?  
DirectorD: I'm downstairs.  
AgentKevlar: Come on up.

Vasquez felt a hot hopeful thing in her chest, which traveled down to her belly and between her legs. Alex hadn't come by at night in months. Vasquez hadn't known how to ask her. She hurried to the door just as the knock sounded.

Alex stood in the hallway looking uncertain. Vasquez opened the door wide and waved her in, her face fighting not to grin and failing.

Alex entered. In her street clothes, with her hair off to the side as she wore it when she was off duty, she looked far less intimidating than she did by day in the suit Winn had made her. Vasquez wanted to caress that hair, slide her fingers through it, but she forced herself to put her hands in her pockets instead. Alex closed the door, looking tired.

"I could use a drink."

"I've got some decent merlot."

"Perfect."

"So to what do I owe the pleasure?"

"I missed you," Alex blurted. She shook her head, blushing. "And that's crazy, because we work together all day every day."

Vasquez shook her head, frowning lightly as she poured two glasses of red wine and brought them over to the couch. "We're different people at work."

"You mean badass?"

"Well, pfft. That, of course. But also more formal, more distracted by the work, the stakes. Trying to remember all the details because getting it wrong on a mission can get people killed. When we're alone, we can be... softer."

Alex sipped her wine. "I miss that. Being soft with you."

"Me too."

"Are we going to be able to go back to that if we're in charge of the DEO?"

"We're not in charge, Alex. You are."

Alex rolled her eyes. "We both know that's not true. We're a team, a unit."

Vasquez felt surprised, and she suspected it showed.

Alex gave a little laugh. "Seriously, Vas? You don't have a frown for this one?"

"I... I didn't know you felt that way."

"When you were gone, and I knew it was my fault that you'd needed to go--"

"J'onn sent me on a mission," Vasquez protested.

"Mm. Or SpaceDad recognized a good excuse to put some distance between us, give us both perspective."

"My perspective nearly got some of our friends killed. One of my friends lost her arms."

Alex nearly spit up her wine. "What?"

"It's okay, she got them replaced with weird alien prosthetics, but it was ugly, Alex. I botched the mission beyond the telling of it. While you were back here saving the world."

"And missing you desperately." Alex shook her head. "You know, I think Livewire has a tiny little crush on you. So did Astra."

Vasquez didn't even deign to reply.

"So do I."

"Only tiny little?"

Alex sipped her wine. "You know I'm not good at feeling things. Feelings are... dangerous."

"Oh, I hear you on that." Vasquez got up and brought the bottle back to the couch to refill their glasses. "So, Alex, after all this time, why are you here tonight? I kind of expected you to stay over at Kara's. I assumed she'd be panicking."

"No, I think she's more grounded than she's ever been. And I think it's because of Lena."

"Is she going to propose?"

"Yes. She's going to have to figure out some cultural things, to honor both Krypton and Earth, and she's a little nervous that Lena might say no at first."

Vasquez nodded. One only had to spend a tiny bit of time with Lena to recognize the self-esteem issues that fought with her stellar mind and finely honed scientific instincts. And body...

"But," said Alex, "she doesn't seem afraid. And I realized that that is because of her rock-hard faith in her love for Lena. You know Kara. She doesn't do anything in half measures."

Vasquez smiled. "The Danvers women don't."

"Hmm. Would you ever consider that?"

"Getting married to someone someday?"

"Becoming a Danvers woman."

Vasquez was never speechless. Silent, yes. Incapable of talking, no. "I. You. Alex, are you... proposing to me?"

"No, don't be silly. But I wondered if it could be something. Not now. In a few years, maybe? Do you think we could build something real?"

Vasquez stared.

Alex hurried on. "You understand why I jump out of buildings. And you've taught me so much these last two years. Hell, ever since I met you, you've been teaching me. And at first, I thought you were just teaching me to be an agent, and I wanted that because I wanted to protect Kara. And then you were teaching me to be a lesbian, and I wanted that because I wanted to finally understand myself."

Vasquez couldn't think clearly, so she just waited.

Alex took her time gathering her thoughts. "But now, after I fucked up with us, and you fucked up with your mission, we've still somehow made our way back to each other. And maybe it's like we can teach each other how to be together. Because I realized tonight when I saw you with those pizzas that maybe, I don't know, maybe you've learned some things from me."

"Like food equals love? Pretty sure I learned that from your sister."

"Uh huh. And where do you think she learned it from?"

Vasquez blinked, and suddenly she realized that was probably true. "You used food to help her get over her homesickness for Krypton."

"I was a kid, and she was always, always hungry. It seemed obvious."

"So, those quesadillas last week..."

"I know you like quesadillas. So I practiced."

"They were tasty."

Alex sighed with relief. "I wasn't sure they were good enough."

Vasquez suddenly thought she might cry. And she hated crying. "Alex... Will you stay tonight?"

"Um, in your bed?"

"Yes, please."

"And, um..."

"Naked? Ideally. But not if you're too tired."

"After I talked to Kara, I just rode around the city on my bike. She had said I should come thank you for bringing the pizza and I knew what she really meant but I was just so scared you wouldn't want... me."

"I want you."

"But I haven't been sleeping more than three hours a night in a long time."

"I am also a very highly qualified cuddler."

"I know you are."

"And as Director of the DEO, you are tasked with making sure all your agents are up to date with their qualifications."

"I am, aren't I...."

"Finish that wine, Alex Heart-of-My-Beating-Heart Danvers. Then come to bed with me."

Alex grinned.

///

At 2:35 in the morning, Jess was lying in her full-size bed, with her ginger Tom Tigger and her tabby Roo lying each on one knee, which made it impossible for her to move, which would have been less of a problem if she had been even the slightest bit inclined to sleep.

Yeah, no.

After dinner that night, which Winn had insisted on having in one of the not decimated restaurants in Alien Alley to support the side, she had been about to invite him back to her place for... a nightcap, maybe more. But then he had told her about Krypto and the trip to Metropolis, so rather than ending the night late, they had ended it early, and that was just depressing. She really liked Winn, hoped there was something there, but it had just been so fucking long since she had... well, fucked. She barely remembered how.

And she loved Krypto. Who didn't? The dog was a canine version of sunshiney Supergirl.

But still...

At 2:53, Tigger stood up, stretched and then jumped down to go eat or poop or do some other cat thing. She ran one finger over Roo's head, and the cat rolled over so that she was no longer on Jess's knee. Jess took the opportunity to get up and go to the bathroom, where Tigger was finishing up in the litter box. They left the room together.

Her laptop was on the island in the kitchen. Maybe some kitten or goat videos on YouTube would distract her, relax her, make her think of something else.

But when she powered up, she saw she had an email.

From Kara.

Which meant, of course, from Supergirl. And that was a strange thought. 

AgentPotsticker: Hey Jess, I need a favor. Can you look at Lena's schedule this week and find a time for her to join me for dinner? And maybe could you book us a reservation at the sushi place she loves so much? It's really important. Thank you.

Jess inhaled sharply. But no. Kara wouldn't... A Super and a Luthor? No. Probably Kara just realized that she hadn't been paying enough attention to her girlfriend, which, to be fair, she really, really hadn't. And Jess knew about the anti-alien violence and Alex's transition to become the Director of the DEO, but Lena Luthor was quality, and Kara really needed to step up her game if she had a hope of keeping her. Jess had threatened the Girl of Steel with the possibility of shovels in their future if Kara messed up. She would do it again if she had to.

But she also knew how happy Kara made Lena, so she looked at Lena's schedule, realized that Thursday night was open, and emailed the manager of Tentaifun about a small private room for seven o'clock.

JessIsBest: Hey Kara. I asked for Thursday at 7 pm in your name, so you're paying. I'll let you know if we have to change the date. But teeny tiny beech sand shovel. Do right by Lena.

///

Krypto had hurried into Scruffy's nest and Smelled All the Things with great interest while Scruffy filled a brand new bowl with Krypto's kibble and then cooked things, the way People did, and ate the things, and then sat watching things happen on the box opposite the couch, all the while slowly stroking Krypto's fur and sighing deeply. 

Krypto sat up, sniffed Scruffy, and curled more tightly against his thigh. Usually, by this time at night, Kara had changed her fur and lain down, with or without Soft Hands and Beautiful Voice, and they would all sleep.

Not tonight. Krypto sat up again and licked Scruffy's face. He seemed sad, and anybody who gave Krypto peenabuttrcrkrz deserved love. He could smell Very Serious on Scruffy and looked around to see if she was there but she wasn't.

Krypto settled down again, sad for Scruffy. Obviously, he was sad because Very Serious wasn't there to give him biscuits for being good.


	9. What We Do When We Wake Groggy

Cat rose early, did her yoga, fed her son and sent him off to school, and then went to CatCo, her Once and Future Kingdom. It felt surreal and awkward and a bit off to run it without actually owning it, but Lena had rebuffed her first attempt at buying shares of it back. She knew that the woman would eventually let her buy back a majority (while making a tidy profit). But she also knew that while the aliens of National City were in danger, Lena would be too distracted to bother thinking about it.

Fine. Cat could bide her time and strengthen CatCo's brand.

And Kara, or Supergirl, or both, could help.

Cat strode into CatCo strategizing about how to get her empire back. When she sat at her desk and opened her laptop, she saw an email from Kara from zero dark thirty in the morning and opened it, intrigued.

KDanvers: Hey, Cat. I need a recommendation. Do you know any really good jewelers, like the kind that make jewelry? Thanks.

Huh. Make jewelry?

Because if it was about a ring, any jeweler could source a ring, even finding some conflict-free diamonds.

But then, rings were human. What if other... types of people used different jewelry to... stake a claim?

JungleCat: You want Stephan's. He's based in England. York, I think. I'll look up the email and send it later today.

///

Lucy kissed Maggie goodbye and ran down to the Lyft that would take her to the DEO. After a hot night of tantalizing sex, she was relaxed, loose, confident and happy.

And that thought nearly stopped her in her tracks as she exited the car and looked up at the DEO's skyscraper. For a hot second, she wondered if she should rethink her decision to turn down the gig training rookies in National City. But a bigger part of her knew that she was at least half convinced that the relationship with Maggie was working, not despite, but because of their living in two different cities. A long distance relationship forced them to be clear on their boundaries, be intentional about spending time together. She didn't want to have what happened with her and James happen to her and Maggie. Maggie deserved better than that.

She kept walking. And then she realized that she deserved better too.

Okay. Not good at emotions. She knew that about herself. But it was better to figure out her feelings slowly than not at all. 

She took the elevator a long way up to the command center. With Alex as the new Director of the DEO, all the regional directors were going to meet and basically kiss her ring and promise fealty.

Well, not really. But it felt a little like that. And she knew that the Manhattan, DC and Chicago directors were going to push back at this "new girl" (emphasis on girl) taking the lead role in the national organization. Alex was going to require backup.

Well, Major Lucy Lane was ready to provide backup to Alex Danvers.

Agents Susan Vasquez and Winn Schott, Jr. were womanning and manning the comms together. In the background, she recognized Holtzman, Finn and... Jimmy Olsen.

Deep sigh.

She approached Vasquez. "Major Lucy Lane, reporting for duty."

Vasquez shot up from her station and hugged her. "Good to see you, Major. The Director is waiting for you. Follow me."

And Lucy followed to the office that had belonged to J'onn Jonzz and now belonged to Alex Danvers. The moment she stepped into the room, she could feel the difference. Alex was back, in a big way. It wasn't just the rad suit or the gay hair. It was something else. Vasquez didn't even give her a glance, which was a little strange, given how those two had been giving each other sad puppy eyes for the last--

Oh.

That.

Dansquez were back together again. Dansquez for the win. Lucy grinned.

Alex asked, "Something you want to comment on, Lane?"

"You almost make me want to rethink my declining your offer. Almost."

"Your loss, toots. I mean, Major."

"I could go by Major Toots, but only in private. But I suspect you have better things to be... talking about in private."

Alex grinned. "That I do. So. I've been looking at regional directors, their resumes, etc. And it seems to me that you are overdue for a promotion. So, Lieutenant Colonel Lane, congratulations."

"I... Well, that's. Thank you, Director."

"None needed. You have been holding the line for years out there in Nevada, and I trust you more than almost anybody. We need to hold the detainees tight, protect our citizens from alien threats and protect our aliens from citizen threats. Your work is integral to the mission of the DEO nationally."

"Thank you, ma'am!" Lucy said sincerely.

Alex waved that away. "Go see Pam in HR after this. But Lucy, things are going sour, not just here in National City, but across the country. So I have procured money and resources to expand your holding facilities. And yes, I know, construction comes with its own security problems, but I don't see another option. You are close to capacity most of the time. We need to increase our capacity."

"We'll need more people."

"On it. We are recruiting in seven different cities. And we're trying to recruit recruiters so we can further widen our net."

"Excellent. Um, if I can ask. I read about the school bus and the alien restaurants..."

"Yeah, the jury's still out. But that is one of the reasons we would really like to expand your holding capacity..."

"Got it."

"Say hello to Maggie for me."

"Um. I will. But. Um, she did ask me about you and Vasquez... Maybe that's private and I shouldn't..."

But Alex smiled. "Vasquez and I are good. Really good. Go talk to Pam. Make sure to snag an oatmeal cookie. And if you ask nicely, she might even give you one for Maggie. Pam always had a soft spot for Maggie."

///

Millie Bernetti kissed her wife goodbye and got into her car to drive into National City. Normally, the commute energized her, but then, normally, she would be driving to her restaurant, prepping, commanding, and most of all feeding.

So not that. Not today. Not that anytime soon. Luckily, the editorial offices for Taste the Bern magazine were in a different part of town, and that was where she was headed. She had appointments with her bank manager, an insurance consultant, her staff, and, interestingly Kara Danvers (i.e., Supergirl).

And that last promise of an interesting conversation gave her (just) enough energy to get her through all the other meetings.

She had received the email from Kara the night before. Apparently the superhero hadn't been able to sleep; well, Millie couldn't blame her. Probably a lot of people in National City were having trouble sleeping these days. Millie sure was. So was her alien wife.

So when Millie pulled up Kara's email, it had brought up a whole lot of feelings.

KDanvers: Dear Ms. Bernetti, I need to talk to you about a particular alien dessert. If I found the recipe for it, could you help me source the ingredients or figure out replacements? It's for a very special occasion. I might need help cooking it too... Thank you very much.

Millie leafed through the recipe book her alien mentor had left her. The self-made index was crude, but the only entry for Kryptonian desserts was a custard of sorts used in the ritual of marital engagement. 

Huh.

So Kara and Lena were finally a thing. It was about damn time.

///

Lena was exhausted. She had lain in her king-sized bed, alone again, unable to sleep until just before the birds started chirping, and when her alarm went off she nearly hit the ceiling. Then she smacked the alarm and lay back, heart still beating wildly. She thought back to her dreams, a practice she did as a matter of course; she had often solved engineering problems in her sleep. And although the red sunlamp grenade had been a part of one of her dreams, it had not been in either an engineering or a sexy capacity, but part of yet another attack on her, this time without Jess there to save the day. Or Supergirl.

It was a bit like dreaming about having her period a few days before it was due, except in this case, she was clearly worried about an assassination attempt. Lex was usually prompt, if annoyingly consistent. She felt she was overdue. And Supergirl had been... less available lately, except for that excellent French lunch a few days back.

Lena understood. She had dropped by the DEO to discuss some things with Winn and had seen Alex and the waves of worry and distraction just rolled off her, as she hurried past Lena in the corridors without seeing her. And that was unlike Alex. And if Alex was in that shape, Lena knew that Kara would be trying very hard to help.

Lena had followed Winn down to his lab, where Krypto was sleeping on his bright red bed in the corner, with a purple teddy bear, well chewed.

Winn had shown her the sonic anesthetizer he had brought to the clinic. When she had seen it the other night, she had gotten ideas for narrowing the bandwidth that she wanted to discuss with him. But then Krypto woke, jumped up and trotted over, insisting on belly rubs.

And Lena was a Luthor with all that that meant. But belly rubs were belly rubs.

Actually, that had been just what she needed. Then Winn had said he had to get Krypto to Metropolis, and Lena had put a hand on his arm.

"Winn, I'm not sure this is my place, but I don't know who else there is, so I'll just... Jess is very special, and she is probably my best friend aside from Kara, maybe better in some ways since I've known her forever and worked with her very closely for years."

"Um, is this the shovel talk?"

"It is. And when a Luthor uses a shovel..."

He swallowed. "It's a very big shovel?"

"Size doesn't matter. The point is, your body will never be found. Are we clear?" She smiled sweetly.

"I will never, never, never hurt Jess."

"Be sure that you don't. I'm glad we had this chat. Enjoy Metropolis. Say hello to Clark."

And maybe it was the combination of belly rubs and death threats, but she felt so much more herself than she had felt all week.


	10. Not Quite How That Was Planned to Go

When Lois got the text from Clark, she sighed deeply, but then went out and bought another two jars of spaghetti sauce, two more boxes of capellini, and four more pounds of ground beef. Then on second thought, she bought six more peppers and three more boxes of mushrooms, and another bag of onions.

Feeding one Kryptonian was bad enough. Feeding two was a Herculean task.

Not that she resented the occasional presence of Kara in Metropolis. Who could resent that ray of sunshine? And if she asked, she knew Clark and Kara would be more than happy to do the cooking, with or without superspeed. But she did like doing things for them. It made up for the times when they saved her or her city. 

Or, you know, the world.

So by the time Clark came home from working with Winn and Krypto at the Metropolis DEO, she had one Dutch oven filled with spaghetti cooking and another filled with meat sauce.

"Hi, hon," said Clark, setting his satchel on the couch. "That smells fantastic."

"Why didn't you invite Winn? We certainly have plenty of food."

"Mm. Kara seemed to want to talk to just me. I mean, me and you. She said it was important."

"So when is she getting here?"

He looked at his watch. "Soon. She said she'd pick up dessert first."

They heard a thump on their balcony and Lois sighed and went and opened the door. "Hey, Kara. I hope the neighbors didn't see you."

"Whoops! I doubt it, though. It's just that I caught that amazing smell and wanted to get here while it was still hot!"

Lois didn't bother to point out that they were hardly going to let it get cold before she got there. Hungry Kryptonians often didn't make very much sense. "It's hot. What did you bring for dessert?"

"The best éclairs in Paris!" Kara grinned.

Lois gave up. For Parisian éclairs, Lois could tell her neighbors they had been hallucinating.

///

Maxwell Lord sat in his office reading the reports from his company's departments and trying hard not to growl. LCorp was stealing his market share in a whole number of subfields, and it pissed him off.

Also, Cat was back in charge of CatCo and he had been sure that she would not be in control of her empire when she came back from working for the last president. He had thought she would be poor and vulnerable. But perhaps he had underestimated the power of CatCo Worldwide Media and the DEO.

He stood up and stretched, then walked over to the windows to look out on National City. The short term of prison time he had endured the previous year for the hand-dominance fiasco and the theft of kryptonite had given him a profound appreciation for the most basic parts of free life: a ten-minute shower, decent coffee, easy personal safety.

He had accidentally made friends with an Infernian teenager whose life he had saved, after which the alien had let it be known that anybody who messed with Max would get burned. Literally. And that had fundamentally shifted Max's thinking on aliens.

He still didn't like alien superheroes racing to save humans and make them soft and helpless, but he recognized that not all aliens were villains either. And it was one thing to build technology to potentially protect humans from stronger aliens, but it was another to burn down their restaurants. That was a bridge too far, even for him.

He looked through the pile of folders on his desk, which his personal assistant left in the top left corner as a sign that it was work that could wait, important but not necessarily urgent. The top one was marked “Clippings.” He sat and sifted through bits clipped from the Times, the Post, the Tribune…

And there sat one with Cat Grant’s byline. As he read about the schoolbus from St. Christopher’s on its afternoon route bringing the children home, the children singing and shrieking, the boys making fart noises and the girls playing patty-cake, he wondered why Cat would be writing about such things and why his assistant would think to cut this out for him, since it wasn’t as if—

And then the small tanker zoomed through the intersection, crashing into the bus and setting it all ablaze.

Okay, well, a terrible tragedy yes, but—

A Fourian mother stepped out of a donut shop, sensing the disaster and diving on top of two of the children who had just hopped off the bus, apparently her daughter’s human best friends. Not her daughter, who was too close to the bus to save.

Max’s heart dropped to his stomach, undoubtedly Cat’s intent.

He scanned further down the article and saw LordTech mentioned. Apparently, the tanker’s driver had a LordTech smart prosthetic in his shoulder that had either malfunctioned or, the police suggested, possibly been tampered with from a distance, causing the man to wildly turn the wheel and sending him cannoning into the school bus. Enquiries were being pursued, according to NCPD Detective Sargent Maggie Sawyer, the very woman who had arrested Max himself. 

The FBI was also involved, investigating the incident as a possible hate crime, which was under federal jurisdiction. And given that aliens were involved, he knew that the “FBI” really meant the DEO, under its new director, Alex Danvers.

His first thought was that those two very competent women hated him, and he was going to have to get out in front of this. His second thought was that he needed to have a conversation with his assistant about what counted as urgent. His third thought was that this was not what Lillian had had in mind when she was weaponizing his smart prosthetics, he was sure of it. But then she was in prison too, as he had just been, so maybe somebody else in Cadmus was taking the organization in a new, much deadlier direction.

And that was appalling, of course it was. Killing innocent children was just wrong, even if some of them were aliens. But…  
But it also might be an opportunity for him to rehabilitate his reputation, maybe even rebrand LordTech. Clearly, this needed some consideration.

///

Dr. Callie Torres looked at the X-rays on the light box. It was no use. She knew that different species often had different metals in their blood, the way humans had iron. The most common was copper, and she was learning to tell when its presence was creating an artifact or a false reading on an X-ray, but this was something else.

Her phone buzzed, but she ignored it. Anybody at the clinic who needed her would page her. Most other things were unimportant.

She pulled the X-rays down and tried to think of another way to check the patient's state. An ultrasound?

Above her head, the loudspeaker announced, "Attention all personnel. Code Black. Repeat. Code Black. Proceed to your stations. Code Black. Repeat. Code Black."

Callie's stomach fell to her feet. Code Black. She remembered that from Seattle Grace Mercy Death.

Code Black meant a bomb threat.

///

Supergirl was flying back to the DEO after talking with Millie Bernetti, and she had the signed NDAs folded up in the shoulder pocket of her cape when she heard the Luthor Clinic's Code Black, banked and flew as fast as she could, using her X-ray vision to scan the building for explosives. 

Her hearing also took in Lena and Callie's heartbeats, but she had to stay focused on the threat. It was a hospital, and as Lena had said in the past, she had to be a hero for everyone, not just the people she loved most in the world.

The Emergency Room was rigged to blow. She said, "Vasquez, Alex. The clinic is having a bomb threat. I think it's the ER. Lena is there, and Callie, and probably a few hundred alien patients and more doctors. Get your asses out here! We'll need J'onn and M'gann too!"

And then she swooped down, flew through the glass sliding doors which did not sense her moving at super-speed, spraying glass everywhere, and then she raced to the janitor's closets to strip out the C4 and fly it away over the river, dropping it into the water to explode as she raced back to the hospital to double check that there hadn't been more.

Too late.

Somewhere on the third floor, a room exploded. 

Third floor. Pediatric oncology. She flew faster than she knew how to, blew her freeze breath into the fires, dispelling the smoke. Alarms were going off all over the hospital and the wails of terrified, sick alien children cut the air. She had failed, and she couldn't stop. In one MRI-type room, where a wall was melting, she scooped three bald children and a green doctor and flew them out onto the sidewalk then went back in.

In her side vision, she saw blurs of green and thanked Rao that she didn't have to do this alone anymore. She blew out fires, dispelled smoke, extracted children and clinicians. At some point she realized that the DEO had sent SUVs and helicopters, and NCGH and St. Olaf's had sent their helicopters to evac patients and bring them back to the other hospitals. 

When she finally heard no more cries, she landed at the incident command post, where the Martians were checking in with Vasquez and Alex was giving orders. She saw James, Winn and Holtzy trotting off in one direction, while Finn came straight to her.

"Supergirl. Ma'am! Director Danvers wants you to know that they're safe. Dr. Torres and Ms. Luthor--"

And she recognized that Callie's heart was still beating wildly, but Lena's was calm and measured. Rao, she loved that woman's faith in her. "Thanks, Finn." She took off into the sky to check the perimeter, then landed on the balcony outside the CEO's office in the clinic, which had been built with precisely her in mind.

Lena held the door open. "Thanks, Supergirl. My hero, as always."

Supergirl charged forward and engulfed Lena in a hug. "Rao! Lena, I don't know what I would have done if they'd blown you up before I had the chance to ask you to marry me!"

Lena said, "Um, Kara, tight--"

And Kara let go. "Sorry, sorry!"

And Lena stepped back and then her translucent green eyes went wide. "Marry?"

And Kara's blue eyes went wider. "Oh, shit! You weren't supposed to hear that. I mean, it was supposed to be in my head, not out here!"

And Lena laughed until she cried and Kara stood there looking like a brightly colored and muscular awkward and embarrassed puppy. With a cape.

Finally Lena took a huge breath, leaning on the very solid Kryptonian. "Oh, darling. If you really like, I can pretend I didn't hear it. I know that Jess thinks that the dinner tonight is only intended for us to spend some quality time together. And we both know that my brain goes into hyperdrive during emergencies, assassination attempts, alien invasions... Maybe I misheard you."

"It was supposed to be a surprise," Supergirl said sadly.

"Mission accomplished." Lena caressed Supergirl's perfect face. "And I expect I am going to be surprised all day and half the night, so don't fret, Kara. Also, spoiler alert. I'm probably going to say yes."

And Supergirl grinned. "I've got to check in. See you tonight?" She took off before Lena could answer.

And she only lost her footing a little bit when she landed at the DEO. "Wait. Probably?"

Winn was at his station and Vasquez was coming into relieve him.

“Good job, Supergirl,” said Vasquez.

“Were there any casualties?”

“No, only injuries, fairly minor. You look upset, but it was a successful mission. What’s wrong?”

“Yeah, I may have accidentally told Lena I was going to ask her to marry me. It was supposed to be a surprise.”

“I’m sure it was. Probably a good surprise, I’d think.”

“Oh, I hope so.” She watched Winn gather his things with the Crinkle in full force.

“So,” he said. “Dollywood?”

“No, I’m going to fly around some more, finish my patrol…”

And with a whoosh, she was off.

///

Jess had heard about the clinic bombing while at work at LCorp, and had very nearly panicked, even though she knew Supergirl (and the DEO) wouldn’t let anything happen to Lena (and the hundreds of alien patients and doctors). So she kept on working through the day, and was getting ready to leave around 6:15, thinking of Netflix and strawberry coconut ice cream, when she got a text from Winn.

ForTheWinn: Buy you a drink at Dollywood? We may have some planning to do.

Jess smiled. This dating thing was unexpected and lovely.

JessIsBest: See you in fifteen.

She found him at what she thought of as the Danvers’ table, with a beer for him, a cosmo for her and a steaming basked of fresh mozzarella sticks. “I could get to love you, Winn.”

He blushed but hid it by sipping his beer. “This is going to have to be a working date, Jess. I normally don’t tell other people’s stories, but you and I are the forward planners, and we may need to get ahead of the mayhem.”

She sipped her cosmo, sighing. “What fresh hell?”

“It’s not… Well, it looks like Kara is planning to ask Lena to marry her.”

“Ha. That explains a lot. But why would that…”

“Think about it.”

Jess thought about it. “The wedding will be a target.”

“Yup.”

“At least Lillian is still in prison. So is Lex.”

“Mm. Like that’s ever stopped them. And I’ve been researching Midvale, trying to find a venue that we could protect, but—” Winn shook his head.

“What’s Midvale?”

“Um, the Danvers’ hometown?”

“Surely Lena would want to do it in Metropolis. The Luthor mansion was built to be a fortress.”

“One that Lex and Lillian know intimately.”

“True.”

They sat sipping their drinks thoughtfully. Jess burned her tongue on a hot moz stick. She looked up to see M’gann with a cosmo in one hand and a business card in the other.

“Oh, thanks.”

M’gann put the card on the table. It read, “Crow’s Security, Sophie Moore, Commander and CEO.”

M’gann said, “I didn’t mean to pry, but you guys are worrying pretty loudly. Vasquez gave me this.” She nodded to the man in black tacticals who had checked their IDs at the door.

Jess nodded. “They’re very good. We used them when we had events in Gotham. I hadn’t realized they were branching out.”

“Well, given it’s going to be a private event, we couldn’t very well use DEO troops,” said Winn. “Thanks, M’gann.”

She smiled. “I try to be a full-service bartender.”

///

Lena had her driver, Ted, get her to Tentaifun early, and sat at the bar with a neat whiskey. She had a lot to think about. 

She had been surprised when Jess had informed her that Kara had asked her to make reservations for them at this prime sushi restaurant, and was planning to pay. Even before Supergirl’s blurting about marriage, Lena had noted that this was the restaurant where they had their first, and very memorable, date. She had wondered what the significance might be, but hadn’t dreamed that Kara was thinking about engagement, marriage.

A Super and a Luthor? Who would have imagined such a thing? She had never let herself.

And sure, maybe once or twice in her sleep, she had dreamed of walking down the aisle toward Kara in her Supersuit. After the wedding shenanigans in Metropolis, it had gotten into her head a little bit. But upon waking, Lena had always dismissed the image. She had learned not to imagine or hope for impossible things.

So: Nobel Prize, sure. Personal happiness in a relationship, not so much.

But now, sitting at the bar, waiting for her personal ray of sunshine, she wondered what it would be like, say, waking up on a normal Wednesday morning, rolling over to see Kara there, not because she had visited but because it was her bed too and she lived there.

Kara using superspeed to make pancakes and bacon and eggs, and convincing Lena to have some of it rather than just yogurt and tea.

Kara landing on her balcony at work with salad for her wife, or éclairs from Paris for her wife, or that strange Indian pizza from Sunnydale for her wife.

Lena, being Kara’s wife…

And then, because Lena was a pragmatic scientist, she imagined Lex’s fury, Lillian’s icy disregard, their assassins carrying Kryptonite bullets, setting off a kryptonite bomb, killing Kara, Lena’s wife. They would never accept a Luthor being a Super’s wife, a Luthor marrying an alien. And Lena could never let Kara that close to her, only to lose her to the people who considered themselves to be Lena’s family, and in so very many ways were not.

Kara was. By extension, Alex and their friends were.

Lena signaled the bartender for another whiskey. She sipped it, imagining Kara’s funeral, their friends hating Lena for being its cause, her hating herself, the way she always had before she met Kara. She pulled her phone from her purse just as it buzzed with a text. Kara, of course.

SunshineD: Had to get a dog out of a tree. Be there soon.

And Lena was too close to tears to laugh.


	11. The Best of Our Energies

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sweet soft and canon, the way SuperCorp should always be.

Kara flew by Lena's place to drop off her small bag on the balcony, annoyed at Krypto for making her late. She hoped to be sleeping at Lena's tonight, so she had to walk him first, and then he decided he really had to chase one very surprised cat.

So that had been an interesting experience.

It hadn't helped her jangling nerves. She hated to be late for Lena. And actually, checking her watch as she walked into Tentaifun, she was still five minutes early, but she was sure Lena would have come in even earlier and probably started drinking. They would both be nervous about this conversation, but Kara was sure. And she could be very persuasive.

The kimono-clad hostess greeted her and Kara said, "Danvers, private room for two. My date is probably already here, maybe at the bar?"

And they both turned to look at the bar, but Lena wasn't there. The woman looked back at her, "Which gentleman?"

"No, it's Lena Luthor. I know she comes here a lot."

"Oh, yes, Ms. Luthor was just here. She came in very early, but... I do not see her."

"Ah. I'll just ask the bartender."

The man behind the bar had a kindly face, but Lena wasn't one to spill out her troubles to strangers. Still. Kara came up and asked him, "Was Lena Luthor here recently?"

"Oh, yes, I don't know where she went, but--"

"Was she drinking cosmos or scotch?"

"Whiskey. Top shelf, of course."

Kara got a sinking feeling in her stomach. She pulled out her phone.

SunshineD: I'm here, at the bar.

She waited, trying to be patient, trying not to imagine Lena leaving the bar, running away.

Finally, her phone pinged.

EmeraldL: Sorry, I'm in the ladies room.

Kara asked for directions, and found Lena at the sink, looking... pale? strained?

"Lena, are you all right? Was it the attack today?"

Lena shook her head. "No, just. A case of nerves, I guess. Very unlike me."

"You know what's good for nerves?"

"Well, I already tried whiskey, but..."

"Food, Lena. Empty stomachs breed butterflies."

And even Kara thought that made no sense, but Lena just smiled. "You're right. Let's go eat."

Kara took her hand and they followed the hostess to their small tatami-matted room with the well in the floor under the table. They had no sooner taken their seats than the waitress in a pink flowered kimono brought them a large plate of potstickers and sake.

So they ate the dumplings and Kara told Lena about Krypto getting his leash caught in the branches of the tree when he chased the very surprised cat, and Kara having to climb the tree to get him untangled, and since there were passersby, she couldn't just fly up to do it.

"And I'm pretty sure if he gets the chance to try that again, he will. I yelled at him, but he seemed pretty unrepentant."

"Did he fly?"

"Not exactly, but you know that he has hang-time when he jumps. We still don't know about all his abilities, even after a lot of agility training. Kal-El said he's never seen a dog as good at walking on a narrow wall."

"Kal-El. Superman."

"Um."

"Kara, I've signed all the NDAs. I do know. But when did you see him recently?"

"I had dinner in Metropolis last night. He and Lois said to say hello."

Lena bit her lip. "Did you, I don't know, need to ask his permission? To ask me..."

"What? No, well, sort of but not that part. I needed to borrow something from him. Also, Lois gave me a pep talk, and she is a very peppy person as it turns out... I really don't know her all that well. I didn't even meet James until he came out to live here in National City."

"You sound sad."

"Family was big for us on--" She glanced at the thin walls. "Back home. And the Danvers, well, you've seen what they're like. It was the same on, where J'onn's from, and he has reproduced that at... Alex's job. But Clark grew up on a rural farm with elderly adoptive parents and no siblings or cousins. So he doesn't think to share his life with me."

"Well, as you know, in my experience siblings can be a mixed bag."

Kara nodded, swallowing the last of the shumai. "Oh, that does take the edge off. Lovely."

Two waitresses came in to remove the appetizer plate and set down the sushi boat. Kara couldn't help herself. She positively glowed. A little wooden ship with enough sushi for four humans always made her ridiculously happy. "It's so pretty!"

And Lena laughed. But then she got serious. "So, is this where we have the talk?"

"What? No, there's time for that later. Right now, we simply nourish ourselves. Important discussions can't be rushed, and shouldn't happen on an empty stomach anyway."

"Kara, you just put away seven chicken gyoza and five shrimp shumai."

"Yes, and you only had one of each. We have to feed you up." Kara took her chopsticks and picked up a piece of tuna, offering it to Lena.

"Kara, I know what you're doing, reminding me of our first date and being a huge romantic."

"Yup. Open wide. You need feeding."

Lena shook her head but opened her mouth and let Kara feed her the tuna. 

Kara said, "See, Lena, it's not that hard to let someone take care of you. And I mean to take care of you for the rest of your life. Not just protect you from the scary things, although I'll do that too. But I mean to do for you what your family never did. You deserve affection and comfort food and giggles and cuddles. And I know I haven't been as present this past year, but that is exactly what made me realize that I need to be here, with you, permanently. And I know you probably sat at that bar for half an hour working to convince yourself that you didn't need anybody else, and especially not me, or maybe you didn't deserve to be happy... Rao, I don't know. But I need you."

Lena chewed and swallowed. "Kara, my family..."

"Don't deserve you. But mine does. And I intend to keep you and me both safe from your family so that my family can enjoy you and be saved by you and protect you and me, because that's what a real family does, and you deserve a real family. And I would like to offer mine to you, to be your family. Formally. Lena, will you marry me, and be part of the House of El and the Danvers?"

Lena's pale green eyes went wide. This was not the proposal she had expected.

"Kara..."

"Lee, just say yes."

"Kara..."

"You don't have to take my name, but I'd like it if you did. You could be Lena Kieran Luthor-Danvers."

"Yes, but Kara..."

"And yeah, that would totally make Lex lose his shit, but I actually think Lillian kind of likes me. She doesn't want to, but she actually gave me a compliment when we were on the Daxamite mothership. And I think she recognizes my rock-hard commitment to you. She'll come around. Lex won't. He's a bit of a pig, really. Sorry. But I think she will."

"Yes, but--"

"And now that Alex is in charge at... work, you know you have the whole of the, that organization behind us, to protect us from him and other... not-so-pleasant people."

"Well, but--"

"Lee, just think about it. While we eat. Because I'm famished!"

And she grinned her 1000-Watt smile, knowing that even Lena Luthor would be helpless to argue against that.

///

Lena ate slowly, at a loss for words. At the bar it had seemed so clear to her that her family, in their sheer Luthorness, was an ironclad reason why she could not in good conscience tie herself to Kara and her family. Yet somehow, Kara had just turned that around. Earnest Kara.

Lena thought about the solidity of her Kryptonian girlfriend, the heat of her. Going to sleep next to Supergirl was like leaning against a very warm, affectionate wall. Sometimes, arguing with her was the same.

“Kara…” she started.

Kara put her chopsticks down and swallowed. “When I was in junior high, our English teacher made us write a paper about a famous speech, and Alex was very excited for me and encouraged me to look at Kennedy’s speech announcing the moonshot, and at first, I thought it was because it was about humans and space, so, you know, both our families. But then she recited part of it from memory: ‘We choose to go to the Moon in this decade…not because it is easy but because it is hard; because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one we intend to win…’”

Lena looked into Kara’s sapphire eyes and was mesmerized.

Kara continued, “That’s when I realized that the Danvers were a part of the House of El. Eliza and Jeremiah had raised Alex to be just like what my biological parents raised me to be, and I recognize the same thing in you. And I will probably live longer than you, but that is precisely the reason that I want so desperately to spend the next seventy or eighty of my years by your side.”

Lena said, “Kara, I love you, but—”

Kara put one finger to Lena’s lips. “You don’t have to answer right away. Let’s finish dinner, let your thoughts settle in your heart. Then we’ll go back to your place, if that’s all right with you, have dessert, talk a bit more. And stop thinking about the reasons to say no.”

Lena sighed. “You want me to think about the reasons to say yes.”

“No, I want you to think about how you would propose to me, and why.”

And that left Lena thoughtful, especially as Kara carefully scooped both of the sweet omelet sushis onto Lena’s plate, because it was both their favorite, but Kara always gave hers to Lena.

“Off the top of my head, I would have to point out that you are as sweet as this tamago, and if I don’t marry you, who’s going to break my headboard?”

Kara laughed. “You’re off to a good start.”

///

They stood outside under the stars waiting for Ted to pull the towncar around front. Kara was grateful that she had started to put away money each month since their first date, knowing that getting engaged to Lena Luthor and marrying her, if those events ever happened, would be expensive. And she hadn’t ever entirely believed that it would or could happen—or she wouldn’t have flown into a building—but she now felt sure with a warm, solid certainty in her gut. This was right.

Her cellphone pinged as they got into the car.

DirectorSis: Did she say yes?  
AgentPotsticker: Not yet.

Lena glanced over. “Alex?”

“Yeah, she’s checking in on me. Whenever I do something stupid, like fly into a building—”

“Wait, you—”

“Yeah, yeah. That’s what happens when you realize you need to marry your best friend.”

Lena fell silent as they slid through the city, the streetlights and the shadows alternately revealing and concealing.

Kara idly wondered what she should wear to marry Lena. She had felt awfully snazzy wearing the white tie and tails at Clark’s wedding. Wouldn’t that make Eliza lose her shit.

“You’re smiling,” said Lena.

“I’m happy.”

“But I haven’t said yes yet.”

“You will. You know I’m the one that can make you happy, safe, appreciated. And I know I haven’t been doing so well on that last one lately, but I’m going to work on that from now on.”

“Why do I feel Jess had words with you?”

“A very small shovel might have been mentioned. Will she be your best person?”

“Probably. She’s the only one— Wait. I see what you did there.”

Kara grinned as the car pulled up in front of Lena’s building and they got out.

///

The moment they entered Lena’s apartment, Lena automatically scanned the apartment and then jumped and pushed Kara back into the hall.

“There’s a bomb on my balcony.”

“Um, no, actually, that’s my lunch bag. I didn’t want to have it with me at the restaurant, so I dropped it off here. I’m sorry, Lena. Take deep breaths. Your heart is hammering.”

“I’m aware,” said Lena drily as they reentered the condo.

Kara quickly crossed to the balcony door and opened it to extract her blue lunch bag. Lena saw that her hands were shaking, and that made Lena pause. Kara carried the bag over to the kitchen island and set it down, unzipped it and lifted out a pale blue ceramic bowl, its lid blazoned with the sigil of the House of El. Then she said, “Can I borrow your blanket?”

Lena frowned. “Why would you—”

“Please. Would you do me the great favor of lending me your blanket?”

“Uh, yes?”

Kara went back into the living room and opened the blanket chest under the window, lifting out the bright red blanket that Clark had given Lex and Lena had taken when Lex went to prison. She came back and handed it to Lena.

“I went to Metropolis to ask Clark if he wanted his blanket back.”

Lena felt nervous. “Did he?”

“He had forgotten about it, so no.”

“You look unhappy.”

“Sometimes Clark is such an Earthling.”

“Do you want it, Kara?”

“Yes, I do.”

Lena felt like she was going to cry, and Luthors didn’t cry. She handed it back to Kara. “It’s your blanket, Kara.”

Kara’s hands were shaking harder as she took it back and shook it out so that the crest of the House of El was showing. She brushed her fingers over it. “It took me a while to figure out how to mix our customs, because I wanted to do this right.”

With the blanket in both hands, the crest facing Lena, Kara got down on one knee. And although her hands were shaking, her voice was confident and sure. “Lena Kieran, of the House of Luthor, a life alone is a heartless life. I want to offer you my heart to live in and my family’s crest to be yours. Will you accept me, Kara Zor-El Danvers of the House of El.”

She offered Lena the blanket.

And Lena knew all the reasons she should say no:

Her criminal brother  
Her genocidal mother  
The perennial target on her back  
Her own long-icy heart

And suddenly none of that made any difference.

She reached out, took the blanket from Kara, saying, “I, Lena Kieran of the House of Luthor, accept you, Kara Zor-El Danvers of the House of El. I accept your heart and offer mine in return. I want to be your wife, and you to be mine.”

Tears were streaming down her face. “God, Luthors don’t cry.”

Kara stood and wrapped the blanket around her. “You are no longer only a Luthor.” She kissed her. “Now we need spoons.”

///

After they ate the custard, and Kara explained about the bracelets they would need to give each other, they went to Lena’s enormous bed and made love, with Lena crying and apologizing and saying how happy she was. Then Lena finally fell soundly asleep, curled in Kara’s embrace.

Kara snaked one arm out to scoop her phone off the bedside table and sent a text to Alex.

AgentPotsticker: She said yes!


	12. The Rules of Engagement

Alex had taken the night shift, knowing that she would not be able to sleep that night and wanting to put her insomnia to good use: now that she was the Director, she knew people would expect her to lead only by day. That might have been J'onn's style, but it wasn't hers. 

Vasquez and Winn had shifted their schedules to match hers, probably expecting her to be expecting nocturnal mayhem. That was just as well. When the command team joined the night watch, they gave it, what was that word? éclat? that it didn't normally have. And that had to be good for morale.

And when, at a bit after 2 a.m., Alex's phone had pinged, she pulled it out of her cargo pocket, read the text, grinned and whooped.

She grabbed first Agent Vasquez, and then Agent Schott and then Agent Holtzman and kissed each of them on the mouth. Holtzy took advantage and kept the kiss going until Vasquez and Winn pulled her off of Alex.

Vasquez, her voice low, growled, "Agent..."

Winn, his voice very high indeed, squeaked, "You might want to stop...?"

Alex looked shocked and Vasquez inserted herself between the Director and the junior agent.

"Whoops?" said Holtzman, looking a little guilty, but not repentant.

J'onn, who had been giving his report, murmured, "You know how last fall I said that your unrelenting seriousness was one of your best qualities? I might have been wrong about that..."

"And I have to disagree with you there, sir, I mean, J'onn," said Alex. "I am not unrelentingly serious, but by Rao, I am serious tonight. She said yes!"

Vasquez let go of Holtzy and would have fallen if the woman hadn't caught her. "Wait, what?"

"Lena agreed to marry my sister!"

The agents cheered, and the color came back into Vasquez's face, and Holtzman let go of her arm.

"Yes. Well," stuttered Vasquez. "Of course. Because we knew. That, that she was going to. Ask."

"Vasquez, are you all right?"

Vasquez sat down in chair at her station, nodding absently. "Yeah, I will be. Just give me a sec."

Holtzman said, "Sorry/not sorry, Director. But does that mean there's going to be another trip to Metropolis?"

Vasquez added, "Or to Midvale?"

And Alex stopped and stared. "Oh, that's going to be... a question. Huh. Well, I guess we'll just have to see what they decide, won't we?"

///

Jess Huang got to work as always just before eight. When Lena hadn't shown up at eight, Jess checked her phone for a text. Maybe Lena had had an idea in the middle of the night and had come in to work on a personal project in the sub-basement. But there were no texts.

Maybe Lena had been abducted? She texted Winn.

JessIsBest: Have you heard anything I should worry about re: Lena?

She sat for three minutes forty-two seconds, sweating, until she received his reply.

ForTheWinn: Yes! She said yes to Kara! (Heart emojis in the seven colors of the rainbow.)

Jess breathed a sigh of relief. Then she texted him back.

JessIsBest: So you were right. We have some planning to do.

ForTheWinn: Called it!

And Jess just rolled her eyes and got on with her day. She could imagine (although she'd rather not) that Lena Luthor and Supergirl getting engaged might have led to some... rather athletic sex. Probably Lena wouldn't be in until 9:00 at least.

///

Millie Bernetti had finally bitten the bullet and gone to Alien Alley to look at the charred remains of her restaurant, with Andrea on one side and her insurance agent, Howard, on the other. Howard was half-human/half-Infernian and was very queeny and very good at his job.

"The police reports were very clear, honey. Hate-crime for sure. We should be able to get you the money to rebuild in a snap." And he actually for-real snapped his fingers. "In between now and then, though--"

"Thanks, Howie. It's just so depressing. I don't even know how to--"

Her cellphone pinged. She dragged it out of her coat pocket. "Probably trying to sell me solar--" Then she really focused.

KDanvers: She said yes! She loved the custard! Cater our wedding?

"Huh."

Her wife leaned in to read the text. "Wait, is that--"

"Kara Danvers. Sunshine personified. Also, apparently, newly engaged to Lena Luthor."

Howie pulled out his phone and Millie clamped her hand down on his wrist and twisted until he dropped his phone. "Professional ethics, Howie. I am your client and that is my professional information that you cannot share."

"Ah, right. You're right. Ouch. But surely they'll announce formally? Soon? Right?"

"Maybe..."

///

Maggie had gotten called out at 7:15 for an alien hate crime, because of course she had. And seeing blue guts strewn across the bus stop bench had been more than enough to cancel her plans for one of those egg-cheese-croissant sandwiches--

More than enough.

She had gotten used to a little gore when she was a rookie, had learned not to lose her dinner or her cool when humans were horrible to other humans. 

For the most part. 

But knowing so many aliens, most of whom were refugees trying to escape war, famine, plague, death--yeah basically the four horsemen of the apocalypse--oh, that just made it all so much harder.

So when she got back to the precinct, she put her phone on vibrate and tried very hard to just get through the paperwork for the case. But then her phone vibrated, and she ignored it, and it stopped and then started again three times, and then it vibrated itself off her desk and onto the floor.

Sighing deeply, she picked it up, only to find messages from Vasquez castigating her for not picking up. She replied tersely:

TomSawyer: Busy with another hate crime. Grisly.  
AgentKevlar: Then a light lunch. We need to talk.

That gave Maggie pause. Why on Earth would Vasquez need to talk to her?

TomSawyer: Come to the precinct. Not interested in food.  
AgentKevlar: Your loss. I thought you liked Infernian barbecue.

And Maggie laughed. Her partner Reynolds glanced at her and rolled his eyes.

TomSawyer: Well, maybe just a little. 12:30?  
AgentKevlar: You betcha!

Maggie shook her head. But when Vasquez showed up an hour later with cardboard boxes, and they found an empty interrogation room, she said, "Since when does Fire Devil do cardboard?"

"Since a few weeks back, when Supergirl freeze-breathed their kitchen fire out, saving the place. Now they've ditched their styrofoam because of her lecture. Also? DEO agents get 10% off at their food truck." Vasquez grinned.

Maggie shook her head. "So, Agent Vasquez, what can I do you out of?"

"Kara's engaged."

Maggie stared.

"To Lena Luthor."

"Well, I certainly wouldn't expect her to get engaged to Mon-Hell, Winn or James. Seriously? When did that happen?"

"Sometime before two in the morning when she texted her sister."

"Hm. Dinner, engagement, sex. Text."

"Yeah, that's what I thought. Anyway, it's going to be a major security issue. So I thought we should start planning, get out ahead of it."

"I'm NCPD, you're national DEO. We don't have jurisdiction."

"And Winn said he's been looking into private security. I recommended the Crows, out of Gotham. But you and I both know that Lena and Kara, due to no fault of their own, are likely to be targets on both a local and national level, given Lena's felonious family and Kara--"

"Felonious? Try psychotic."

"Mm. Your point?"

"Oh, right. Same difference."

Vasquez pulled a metal fork from her cargo pocket and started doing serious damage on the Venusian Pulled Pork. Maggie glanced at the broccoli slaw with tangy something or other and pulled lacquered chopsticks from her bag. They spent a few minutes simply chowing down. Finally, she said, "What do you need from me?"

"You are like me, a forward planner, who understands how the criminal mind works. You've been up against the Luthors before, and I know you love the Danvers sisters."

Maggie looked away.

Vasquez asked, "How's Lucy?"

Maggie couldn't meet her eyes. "Alex asked her to take over the rookie training program here, and she said no, said she preferred the Nevada site."

Vasquez chewed and swallowed. "That doesn't mean--"

"Vasquez? Just don't. The fact that you even think to say that doesn't mean pretty much means it does! She doesn't want me, more than a friends with benefits kind of--"

"No, Maggie." Vasquez rested her hand on Maggie's arm, quietly forcing her to put down her food and pay attention. "I understand Lucy Lane. She is a soldier, like I was. She saw some serious shit out there and it changed her, and not all for the good. She's cautious about relationships because she is convinced that her damage will spill over and damage anybody she cares about. You. And she couldn't bear it if she hurt you like that."

"You don't know that," said Maggie thickly.

"Yeah, I do. Oh, honey. I totally do."

"But you're with Alex."

"Just barely. Yes, I am. Again. But as God is my witness, I don't know how that happened."

"But she was... unfaithful. Wasn't she?"

"She was hurting. Because outside of her job and her relationship with her sister, she has zero self-esteem. And I thought I had fixed that, that I could fix that. But you can't fix people. You can only choose to love them, or not. And I am choosing to love her, and maybe I'll get burned and maybe I won't. But Kara saw her world literally explode and then spent years, years in the Phantom Zone, and then Clark, her one relation on Earth—hell, in the universe—abandoned her, left her with strangers."

"I'm sensing you agree with Alex on this..."

"Don't you?"

"Abso-fucking-lutely."

"So whatever relationship or hurt you and I have had or experienced or suffered because of Alex Danvers, and however much we love Alex Danvers, this isn't about her. It's about Kara. What she needs: backup, security, foot-warmers, advice... Because you just know she would do all of that for any of us."

Maggie sat thoughtfully, nodded. "Okay, I'm in. What do you need me to do?"

///

Astra In-Ze was walking out of an Argo zoning meeting with the mother of all headaches when her interplanetary device pinged with a message from her niece.

KZE: Um, you know how you offered to stand up for me if I decided to marry Lena and she accepted me? So, yeah, that. Could you come to Earth one of these days so we could talk about the customs, figure out how to adapt them for Earth. I made the custard for Lena and she really liked it!

Despite the annoyance that Astra had taken on when she had chosen to take her sister's place on Argo, her niece's enthusiasm was always a welcome part of her day.

GeneralA: Let me fix my schedule. Then I will come by.


End file.
